Briefs

Former journalist joins consultants

The former ABC TV journalist and Liberal candidate Sarah Henderson has joined the communications consultancy the Clifton Group. Ms Henderson, pictured, a Walkley Award winner, has been a presenter on the 7.30 Report and holds a law degree from Monash University.

ADVERTISING

STW net profit

up 5.7 per cent

Marginally higher revenue has helped the listed advertising group STW Communications achieve a 3 per cent increase in first-half earnings to $32 million. The company announced a share buy-back of 10 per cent of its stock. A 5.7 per cent increase in net profit to $17 million was achieved despite the chief executive, Michael Connaghan, pointing to difficult trading conditions. The company was seeking to expand in Australia and in south-east Asia. The guidance for this year of 5 to 10 per cent net after-tax profit growth remained unchanged.

FORECAST

Digital to drive market growth

The chief executive of the media buying company Group M, John Steedman, said at the STW group announcement that he expected "small growth" in the advertising market this calendar year. Free TV digital channels had stabilised their share of the market but not increased it, and digital remained the key long-term driver of market growth, he said.

He doubted that the Rugby World Cup would be a large revenue driver, and suspected that retail would remain challenged, with a knock-on effect on newspapers and magazines.

GROUP BUYING

New system to streamline deals

The fast-growing group-buying sector has sparked another spin-off, a website that collects offers from most of the most popular sites, orders them according to people's preferences and delivers them in one combined email to subscribers. A Sydney company began in April aggregating deals from the top 10 sites and forwarding them to people based on categories preferred and location. Stas Belkov, director and co-founder of DealFetch, said the new system addressed the problem of multiple deals filling up people's email inboxes.

SHARES

Mixed day for media stocks

Media stocks on the Australian Securities Exchange registered a mixed day yesterday, with News Corp's locally listed shares adding 49? to close at $14.79 after posting better than expected results. Network Ten rose 1? to close at 92? after a difficult two weeks. Austar rose 2.5? to 96? while its takeover proposal by Foxtel waits for a verdict from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. APN News & Media fell 1.5? to 94?, Fairfax fell 2? to 76?, Consolidated Media fell 13? to $2.15 and Seven West Media fell to $2.80.