Caxton fronts up to advertising challenge

Caxton generates 95% of revenue from publishing‚ printing and distribution. Its newspaper business is mostly active in the publishing of community newspapers.

With print advertising deteriorating‚ Caxton said it was aiming to secure new advertisers who had not advertised in local newspapers‚ but relied on television. The company has been rolling out websites catering for communities.

It has increased its shareholding in online financial news company Moneyweb to 50.6%. Previously Caxton owned 47.3% of Moneyweb after obtaining control of the company last year.

Caxton added it was also upgrading and installing new printing presses in Johannesburg after securing long-term contracts with media groups Avusa and Independent.

The company has R1.8bn in cash resources as at the end of June. It did not indicate how it intended to use the bulk of this cash for this year. In the full year to end June 2011 Caxton had cash of about R1.6bn. In its full-year results presentation Caxton posted a 3.3% increase in headline earnings per share to 109.75c. The company posted an 11% increase in full year revenue to R4.8bn compared to June 2011. The publishing‚ printing and distribution business reported revenue of R4.58bn versus R4.1bn in June 2011.

In its educational book publishing business Caxton said it had an "exceedingly difficult" year to deal with as provinces had not ordered their full requirements of textbooks.

Caxton said its stationery business went through a rough patch and it had taken steps to rationalise it.

In packaging‚ the profits improved but the unit curtailed volume growth.

The company declared an ordinary dividend of 40 cents per share.

On Wednesday Caxton shares ended up 3.03% to R17.