Saga Communications reported that its net revenue decreased 1.8% to $28.2 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2025 compared to $28.7 million for the same period last year.
Saga says the decrease was not advertising related but due to an industry wide settlement with two music licensing organizations (ASCAP and BMI) resulting in a retroactive rate adjustment of approximately $2.1 million covering the period from January 1, 2022 to the quarter ended September 30, 2025. If not for the settlement, the company states its revenue would only have been down by $120,000 or 0.5%.
For the quarter, Saga had an operating loss of $626 thousand compared to operating income of $1.6 million for the same quarter last year and station operating income (a non-GAAP financial measure) decreased $2.5 million to $3.5 million. Without the settlement the operating loss would have been operating income of $1.5 million compared to $1.6 million and station operating income would have been $5.6 compared to $6.0 million for the same quarter last year. Capital expenditures were $600 thousand for the quarter ended September 30, 2025 which was flat with the same period last year. The company had a net loss of $532 thousand for the quarter compared to net income of $1.3 million for the third quarter last year. Diluted loss per share was $0.08 in the third quarter of 2025. Saga would have reported net income for the quarter without the music licensing settlement.
Saga noted it had $73,000 in gross political revenue for the quarter ended September 30, 2025 compared to $677,000 for the same period last year. For the nine-month period ended September 30, 2025 gross political revenue was $395,000 compared to $1.3 million for the same period last year. Gross revenue would have been flat for the three-month period and down 3.2% for the nine-month period excluding political revenue when compared to the same periods last year.
