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UPDATE 1-CME sees FY EBITDA down sharply, 2010 market recovery

Published 10/15/2009, 09:35 AM
Updated 10/15/2009, 09:39 AM

* CME sees EBITDA at the less than half of analyst fcasts

* Sees TV ad markets growing in 2010

* Shares fall sharply for second straight day (Adds details, quotes, shares)

PRAGUE, Oct 15 (Reuters) - Central European Media Enterprises (CME) said it expects full-year consolidated earnings at $60 million to $70 million, well short of last year's result, and only about half of analysts' previous estimates.

The broadcaster said on Thursday it expected its central and eastern European markets to return to growth next year, with television advertising markets up 2-6 percent, while jumping 19 percent in Ukraine.

"This year was a year when everything went bad," Chief Executive Adrian Sarbu said in an investors' presentation broadcast live on CME's website, www.cetv-net.com.

"(Our customers are) cutting cost in marketing all along our markets. The result is our full-year guidance is unexpectedly very low."

The expected figure would be less than estimates compiled by Reuters, showing 2009 earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) at $146.6 million, and down from $296 million in 2008.

Shares in the company extended losses to fall 8.4 percent in Prague to 463 crowns. They fell more than 12 percent on Wednesday when Sarbu flagged to the market that earnings would be less than market expectations, in a Bloomberg interview.

CME, which operates in seven markets in the region including the Czech Republic and Romania, has been hit by up to 30 percent falls in advertising markets and revenue has dropped up to 40 percent in the first half of the year.

Sarbu said markets hit bottom in the third quarter and would likely stay there until the end of the year.

The group is due to release third-quarter results on Oct 27. (Reporting by Jason Hovet, editing by Jan Lopatka and Rupert Winchester)

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