What Happened?
Shares of media, broadcasting, and digital services company E.W. Scripps (NASDAQ: SSP) jumped 24% in the afternoon session after the company reported mixed third-quarter financial results, where strong operational performance in key areas seemed to overshadow a headline loss.
While total revenue fell 18.6% from the same period in the previous year to $525.9 million, the figure was in line with analyst estimates. However, the company's GAAP loss of $0.55 per share widely missed expectations. Despite these headwinds, investors appeared to focus on a significant positive: adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA). The company reported adjusted EBITDA of $80.43 million, which beat analyst consensus estimates by a notable 17%. This stronger-than-expected operational profitability seemed to outweigh the revenue decline and earnings miss, signaling to investors that the company's underlying business might be more resilient than the headline numbers suggested.
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What Is The Market Telling Us
E.W. Scripps’s shares are extremely volatile and have had 79 moves greater than 5% over the last year. But moves this big are rare even for E.W. Scripps and indicate this news significantly impacted the market’s perception of the business.
The previous big move we wrote about was 1 day ago when the stock gained 5.7% on the news that its Scripps Sports division formed an exclusive broadcast partnership with Major League Volleyball (MLV) to bring the league's 2026 championship to its ION network. The deal included live broadcasts of MLV's two semifinal matches and the championship match in May 2026. This partnership added another league to Scripps Sports' growing portfolio of women's sports, which already featured the WNBA and the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). The move was aimed at strengthening ION's programming with live sports content designed to attract dedicated and advertiser-friendly viewers.
E.W. Scripps is up 4.8% since the beginning of the year, but at $2.64 per share, it is still trading 36.4% below its 52-week high of $4.15 from July 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of E.W. Scripps’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at an investment worth $223.73.
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