Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for our FY 2026 results briefing. I'm Matt Stanton, CEO of Nine Entertainment. Joining me here today is our CFO, Martyn Roberts. On both the continuing business and pro forma basis, we have reported growth in revenue EBITDA and EBITDA margin in FY 2026. Continuing business revenue of AUD 2.2 billion resulted in EBITDA of AUD 379 million, which grew by 17% and is the basis on which the analysts have forecast. On the same basis, NPATA of AUD 147 million and EPSA of AUD 0.093 were both up by 11%. On a pro forma basis, which includes a full year of QMS in both periods. So like for like, on revenue of AUD 2.4 billion, Nine reported group EBITDA in FY 2026 of AUD 560 million up 6% on PCP. The company intends to pay an unfranked final dividend of AUD 0.03 per share.
This brings the full year dividend to AUD 0.075 per share. Of course, we also paid a special dividend of AUD 0.49 per share, fully franked in September last year, following the sale of a stake in Domain. Our net debt at the end of June of AUD 658 million equated to leverage of 1.7 times, which is slightly better than the guidance we gave six months ago. For FY 2026, we are pleased to report profit growth from our outdoor, our mastheads, and streaming and broadcast against the backdrop of our significant portfolio realignment and soft advertising market. On a pro forma basis, Nine's outdoor business, QMS, reported revenue and EBITDA growth of 15% and 18% respectively. This was driven by above-market growth in the key categories of large format and street furniture in both Australia and New Zealand.
QMS's revenue growth was augmented by new contract and site rollouts, as well as the strong performance from the City of Sydney street furniture business. We also reported EBITDA growth for our mastheads, underpinned by a further 15% growth in digital subscription revenue. Nine's quality journalism continues to drive growth in our subscription and licensing revenues. We also reported combined EBITDA growth for streaming and broadcast, underpinned by 34% growth to a record result at Stan and tight cost control in Total Television. During FY 2026, we have also made significant progress in our strategic initiatives. During this latest half, we have completed the sale of Nine Radio and our NBN and Darwin affiliates, as well as Pedestrian Group and our stake in Future Women. We have completed the purchase of QMS and have subsequently locked in the next generation of our National Rugby League rights.
All significant achievements that markedly improve the position of our business for the future. We believe our portfolio now offers the greatest opportunity for optimizing the combined value of our assets, underpinning long-term growth and value for our shareholders. We have continued with our cost-out program and now expect to exceed the previous target of AUD 160 million over the three years to the end of FY 2027. Post-year-end, we also announced some structural changes to publishing, which will result in a net headcount reduction of around 35 people. Within this, we are investing in further growth opportunities as the business model continues to evolve. We continue to focus on efficiently utilizing content across Nine, 9Now, and Stan, using each platform as a promotional tool for the other and consolidating our promotional and marketing functions.
We continue to grow our presence in the video advertising market with ads sold on Nine and 9Now, as well as Stan Sport, HBO Max, and recently launched in Stan Entertainment. During the year, we successfully democratized AI within the business, continuing to expand the use internally. Including promos, creative, semantic search, and credit collection. A significant milestone was the signing of our first licensing agreement with major Australian corporate partners. These deals allow these organizations to use Nine's premium, trusted content to ground their own large language models. Later in the period, we also signed an Australian first AI agreement for news media content with Microsoft Copilot, allowing Nine's professional high-value journalism to play a crucial role in AI outputs generated by millions of Microsoft Copilot users. Together, these initiatives create a new high-margin revenue stream that acknowledges the fundamental value of our journalism in an AI-driven world.
Technology remains at the forefront of our industry, and during 2026, we have made some significant investments. We have accelerated our aim of single platform delivery with the initial launch of our total sales trading platform and further development of our integrated consumer platform. We are also significantly progressed in our project to digitize Nine's publishing and video archives. At this point, I will hand over to Martyn to talk through the group financials.
Thanks, Matt, and good morning, everyone. Before I present the P&L, I would just like to take a minute to acknowledge that this year's results are very complex due to the M&A transactions we made during the year and the non-cash impairment we have taken on Total TV. This slide provides context to help you navigate these results. Starting with portfolio changes, we have carved out discontinued operations, removing divested assets like Domain, Radio, and Pedestrian from our underlying results, while treating NBN and Darwin as affiliates from the 1st of July 2024. When we refer to continuing business basis, this includes QMS results from the 31st of March acquisition date. When we refer to pro forma results. This includes QMS for the full year in FY 2026 and FY 2025 to provide a like-for-like comparison of performance.
In terms of adjustments, under AASB 16 lease accounting, we have applied Nine's lower cost of debt to QMS right-of-use assets, which increases their AASB 16 depreciation while reducing AASB 16 interest. On operating metrics, following the QMS acquisition, we are moving to introduce EBITA, NPATA, and EPSA as core profit metrics for QMS and the group. Acquiring QMS brings significant site lease intangibles onto our balance sheet, which amortize directly through the P&L as a non-cash expense. Moving to these metrics removes this non-cash expense, which requires no cash CapEx for replacement to accurately reflect the underlying cash conversion and core trading performance of the group. EBITA is also the benchmark valuation metric for out-of-home media assets, giving shareholders and analysts a clean like-for-like basis to evaluate Nine Outdoor against market peers.
I would also like to add that for the first time, we have today issued our full annual report on the same day as our results. This report includes our inaugural ESG reporting as well. The next two slides cover the detail of our P&L on both a continuing business and pro forma basis as Matt has already covered. Slide eight details the composition of specific items, which totaled a net cost after tax of AUD 481 million for the year. Aside from the impairment and the content-specific provisions, which I will touch on on the next slide, the major components of specific items included restructuring costs, primarily redundancies of AUD 14 million, and around AUD 25 million of transaction costs, mainly relating to the acquisition of QMS and our divestments. The technology transformation projects include development of Nine's total trading platform and our HRIS Workday.
The biggest component of specific items relates to the accounting-led impairment of Nine's Total TV business of AUD 404 million after tax. Page nine details the components of the impairment and also shows the future year P&L impact. The impairment has been made mainly against broadcast licenses, PP&E, software, and legacy international content rights. Importantly, no impairment or onerous contract provisions have been applied to our sports rights or local programming, which continue to deliver strong advertising revenues and benefits across the broader streaming and broadcast business. With part of the impairment taken against property, plant, and equipment, there will be a reduction in FY 2027 depreciation expense of AUD 36 million. Also in this table is the impact of the content-specific provision. This provision of AUD 23 million relates to a number of U.S. series acquired in the past under a legacy life-of-series deal, which we are no longer utilized.
The waterfall chart on page 10 illustrates our ongoing work on costs. Through FY 2026, we have removed a further AUD 70 million of recurring costs, taking our two year total to AUD 130 million. As a result, we are now on track to exceed our previous three year estimate of AUD 160 million in annualized savings to the end of FY 2027. A strong focus on costs and efficiency of spend is now deeply ingrained in Nine's DNA. Whilst we are ahead of earlier targets, we will continue to focus on further opportunities going forward. Page 11 shows the movement of Nine's net debt from the starting position at 1st of July 2025 of AUD 450 million - AUD 658 million we have reported for 30th of June 2026. This includes the net impact of the Domain sale and special dividend, the sale of Nine Radio, NBN, and Darwin, as well as the acquisition of QMS.
It also includes the AUD 170 million in capital gains tax that has been paid across the year due to the sale of our share in Domain. Leverage of 1.7 times at June 2026, post-completion of our M&A transactions, was slightly below previous guidance. Whilst the recent asset sales have done much to offset the capital gains tax relating to the Domain sale, much of this benefit will be reduced in FY 2027 by the voluntary prepayment of FY 2027 and FY 2028 PAYG installments. These prepayments ensure Nine's franking account balance returns to a surplus as soon as possible following the impact of the fully franked special dividend and the tax benefits realized from sale transactions. This will obviously result in reduced tax payments in the next two years. As a result of these prepayments, Nine is expecting leverage to remain broadly around current levels through FY 2027.
We've included a new slide on page 12, which shows the key metrics of our debt profile. We are fully hedged for FY 2027 interest and 50% hedged for FY 2028. In the coming weeks, we will commence an amend-and-extend process to increase the tenor of the three tranches of our net debt. With that, I'll now hand back to Matt.
Turning now to the divisional results. Looking first at the performance of Nine's mastheads on page 14, we can see that with total revenue up by more than AUD 10 million, growth in digital revenues more than offset the decline in print. We were particularly pleased with our digital subscriber performance, which resulted in digital subscription revenue growth of around 15%. That marks the sixth year out of the past eight that we have achieved double-digit subscription revenue growth. The modest 3% decline in print sales was similarly pleasing. Nine's metro mastheads were however impacted by the softness in the broader advertising market. We reported another strong cost performance from the mastheads, with underlying cost inflation and targeted investment predominantly offset by savings from print as well as the AUD 4 million net reduction in defamation provisions. Overall, EBITDA growth of AUD 6 million - AUD 153 million resulted in a 33% margin.
The AFR was a standout performer with high single-digit revenue and EBITDA growth across the year. In terms of overall publishing results, which include nine.com.au and Drive. We reported revenue of AUD 518 million and a combined EBITDA of AUD 150 million, which was down marginally on FY 2025. We announced the sale of Pedestrian in June for a nominal sum, but with an incremental tax loss benefit of around AUD 18 million. As a result, this is excluded from both FY 2025 and FY 2026 as a discontinued business. After a disappointing contribution from nine.com.au, we relaunched the business late in the period, streamlining the website and app and refocusing the content on a more monetizable audience. We continue to invest in Drive, and were rewarded with 27% growth in revenue, driven by 88% year-on-year growth from the marketplace business. Drive remains well-positioned for future growth. Moving on to streaming and broadcast.
Together, our streaming and broadcast business recorded EBITDA growth in FY 2026, with a record result at Stan and a relatively robust result for Total Television, underpinned by solid cost performance. During the year, Nine brought its streaming and broadcast businesses closer together with a number of key initiatives. In particular, the continued optimization of our market-leading content across both platforms, with a great example being the innovative MAFS. After The Dinner Party offering from Stan, driving new subscribers to Stan. From a technology perspective, Nine is working towards the unification of the Stan and 9Now tech stacks, and the use of the Nine User ID to direct further traffic to Stan through our Pathways to Stan initiative. We continue to focus on Nine's premium offering in the digital video advertising market, with the introduction of ads on Stan Sport, coupled with our sales agreement with HBO Max.
In total, digital video advertising sold by Nine in the latest half of FY 2026 grew by around 20%. It has been a time of transformation for streaming and broadcast as we position ourselves for the future, enabling these latest results with strong growth at Stan and a resilient result for Total TV in a difficult free-to-air advertising market. Turning to the results for Total TV on page 17, the AUD 134 million in EBITDA reported by Total TV was down 12% on FY 2025. Audiences remain strong. For the past six months, Nine recorded audience growth for Total TV in total people and 25 - 54s, as well as 5% growth in the younger 16 - 39 demographic, with shows like "Married at First Sight" up 88%, the National Rugby League season to date up 6%, and a record men's State of Origin series up 9% on last year.
While audience performance was strong, the broadcast TV advertising market was soft, cycling both the Paris Olympics and the positive impact of the April–May 2025 federal election campaign. The Total TV ad market declined by 10% for the year. Nine's revenue was down 9%. However, excluding the Olympic impact, we estimate revenues were down circa 2%. Total Television costs declined by AUD 80 million as Nine again achieved efficiencies. Adjusting for the Olympic impact, costs were down marginally, with cost savings of around AUD 55 million offsetting content and wage inflation. In FY 2026, Stan reported its fourth successive year of profit growth for a record EBITDA result of AUD 81 million, up 34% on FY 2025. Revenue growth of 16% was underpinned by the strong performance of sport. The new Premier League contract underpinned 50% growth in average sport subscribers and enabled a price increase in July 2025.
As a result, ARPU across the year increased by 8%. Stan's margins expanded further across the year. Entertainment costs were down year on year, showing ongoing cost discipline across the entertainment portfolio, while higher sport costs reflected acquisition of the Premier League rights. Following on from the successful inclusion of advertising in Stan Sport in 2025, Nine has recently introduced an advertising tier to Stan Entertainment furthering Nine's ability to generate incremental revenue in the digital video market. The next couple of slides focuses on the pro forma results of our outdoor advertising business, QMS Media. As we only owned the business for three months, the actual EBITDA contribution was AUD 54 million reported or AUD 25 million pre-AASB 16. These results are covered in detail in appendix 2. On a pro forma basis, QMS Media reported growth in net revenues of 15% to AUD 295 million.
This compared with the industry growth of 6% in Australia and 11% in New Zealand. The outperformance stemming from QMS Media's concentration on the higher margin categories of the market, as well as the rollout of incremental sites. Slide 20 shows a pro forma profit performance of QMS Media for the year to June 2026. On a pre-AASB 16 basis, QMS Media reported EBITDA of AUD 88 million at the high end of the guidance we gave in early June, and 15% up on FY 2025. QMS Media finished FY 2026 in a strong position. Highly digital, innovative, with long-term leases, and positive operating momentum. The alignment with Nine is clear. Digital screens, scale, data, and sales relationships. QMS Media extends Nine's multi-platform advantage and reinforces our strategy around brand building and premium environments.
Moreover, we have been really pleased with the QMS team, not just the quality, but how they have fitted in and work seamlessly with the broader Nine group. We see a lot more opportunity to come in FY 2027 and beyond. Wrapping up these results, our ASX release this morning includes an updated outlook and view of current trading, which I refer you to. Our reshaped portfolio provides us with a markedly different earnings profile, with a greater weighting to growth and further cross-platform opportunities. As a result, we expect to report another year of pro forma revenue and EBITDA growth for Nine in FY 2027. Operationally, through Q1 to date, Nine has recorded ongoing growth in growth assets of digital publishing, QMS, and Stan, while the broadcast advertising market remains challenging.
On the regulatory front, the recent passing of the News Media Bargaining Code by the Australian Parliament is arguably the most consequential outcome for Nine and other media companies as it delivers long-term sustainable investment in journalism. It is rightly a testament to the critical democratic and cultural value of our journalism and the news brands that Nine nurtures and invests in. This means the tech platforms that benefit from our journalism will fairly pay for its value. It is this same principle that underpins why Nine continues pushing for AI companies to come to the table and negotiate agreements for the use of our intellectual property in their AI models. We agree with the Prime Minister's strong words. If you invest in creating journalism and artistic work, you must retain the right to determine how it is used and what it is worth. Anything less is theft.
In the year ahead, we look forward to hearing more from the Albanese government on the steps to make the digital advertising market fairer. This is based on the ACCC's recommendations to bring much needed transparency and guardrails to the digital advertising supply chain. Another way of ensuring ongoing sustainability of the Australian media industry would be to ensure companies such as Nine receive a fair share of the government's significant advertising spend. In FY 2026, we laid the foundations for further growth in profitability and shareholder value going forward. In FY 2027, we expect to further leverage these foundations, focusing on the significant opportunities provided by our content and platforms, and the technologies that link them together. In FY 2027, our key growth engines of outdoor streaming and digital publishing are expected to account for more than 60% of revenue and 70% of EBITDA.
Our reshaped portfolio balances the drivers to Nine's long-term profit across subscription and structurally growing advertising assets, with a markedly lesser reliance on legacy advertising assets. This will be achieved through the operational execution of our core operating business, augmented by our commitment to technology initiatives, including AI and licensing. Of course, delivering on our QMS acquisition is at the fore. QMS's growth going forward is underpinned by its strong lease profile and contract momentum. While the opportunities with Nine are just beginning to be realized. There remains significant opportunity for value creation in streaming and broadcast as we continue to optimize the business, focusing on our premium content and the growth opportunities of streaming. Future News is a material project, bringing our news to the forefront of technology and efficiency, and that will launch later in the year.
The combination of our tech stacks will both create efficiencies and further alignment between Stan and 9Now. We are pursuing incremental revenue opportunities, growing our presence in the digital video ad market, and extending our off-platform presence. We are doubling down on our SME product, Nine Ad Manager with the opportunity to extending by our ownership of QMS. The value of Nine's content continues to be recognized by audiences, subscribers, and advertisers, and now a new growing revenue stream is emerging through third-party licensing and AI deals. The recently passed news bargaining legislation paves the way for commercial payments from the big tech platforms. We will continue to progress our technology initiatives, including AI, additional licensing opportunities for our content and the further development of the Nine single platform delivery initiative.
The changes we have made to both our portfolio and operating structure position Nine as a digitally focused and growing media company, deeply connected to consumers and advertisers, and similarly committed to enhancing shareholder value. Now, Martyn and I will take your questions. Thank you Operator, if you could pass through our first question. Thank you.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. First question today comes from Eric Choi with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Could I ask a couple? Just the first one, guidance comments. I think you guys previously gave us splits for your non-growth and growth EBITDA, and now you are saying your growth EBITDA or your growth division EBITDA is going to be about 70% of the total in FY 2027. If you do all the math on the non-growth divisions were AUD 160 million -AUD 170 million in FY 2026, and if that AUD 160 million -AUD 170 million holds into next year, and you gross that up. It sort of suggests you are guiding to group EBITDA of about AUD 550 million, maybe a bit more. So that is the first question, if I could check that. Did you want me to go with the second one, Matt?
Yeah. Go with the second one. What is the second question? Myself and Martyn will take them. Give us the second one and I will see which one we go first with.
Awesome. Maybe just on AI/content monetization, and I apologize if I have missed this, but there has been a number of things you guys have done now. Obviously, you have done the July Copilot deal. February, I think you flagged some seven-digit enterprise deals, and then I do not know if you have won any other new enterprise deals. Probably individually, they are not material enough for an Australian Securities Exchange release. I am just wondering if you bundled all of that together, would you be breaching that 5% or AUD 25 million materiality threshold? Then sorry, mouthful but obviously, on top of AI and content, you could get Meta revenues again. If you put all those things together, could you get publishing EBITDA, publishing revenues up in 2027 versus 2026?
Yeah. Thanks, Eric. A number of questions in those. Say the two questions, maybe I will take the second question first, and then maybe hand over to Martyn for the other question on guidance. Say a few words. Yeah, look the AI deals that we have in place, and the Microsoft Copilot fair to say there is a good pipeline of those as well to come through. But at this point in time, they would not breach the 5%, so we would not go the AUD 25 million you talked about then. It would not be above that. But there is a number in the pipeline. The second question around the News Media Bargaining Code around Meta as well, and would there be a situation where we could see growth in publishing? Well, yes there is. There is a number of variables that fly around not just News Media Bargaining Code.
But yes, there is a world there of growth in publishing. We will see, and I will give an update of where we go through the course of the year as negotiations or not go forward. If you talk about your first question around guidance around that, we are not going to steer to an exact number from a guidance point of view. As you can imagine, there is still a number of ups and downs and opportunities and also risks to manage. I do not know, Martyn, if you have got anything to say on it.
Yeah. I think what we have said before Eric is that 45% of revenue in FY 2025 was from non-growth businesses. I am not sure whether we had ever said what the EBITA split was. But if your assumption is that in FY 2026, the non-growth businesses were AUD 160 million - AUD 170 million, and that they stay flat and you gross that up by 30%, then you do get to a number of AUD 550 million, but that has a lot of assumptions in it, in terms of whether those businesses stay flat or not. So there is a lot of variables in that. The main guidance we are giving is that we are going to focus on revenue and EBITA growth in FY 2027 after growth in FY 2026.
Awesome. Thanks, Matt. Thanks, Martyn.
Your next question comes from Entcho Raykovski with E&P. Please go ahead.
Hi, Matt. Hi, Martyn. My first question is just a clarification also around the guidance. Your expectation for growth in FY 2027, do you expect that you will deliver this even without the AUD 14 million benefit from the TV impairment, or are you taking that benefit within your guidance? Because it is a straightforward one, if you can answer that, and then I have a couple others.
Yeah. Martyn, do you want to say that?
Yeah. I think our guidance is that we will have EBITDA growth over and above that AUD 14 million of benefit from the write-off of that content.
Okay, great. That is very clear. On g iven QMS revenue is up in the mid-teens in the first quarter, it seems like your expectation for double-digit growth in EBITDA. Even you have got the synergy impact on top of that. That feels like it is more of a floor, particularly because the comps look like they get easier as the year progresses. I suppose my question is that the case and is there perhaps anything to flag on margins, which perhaps will put pressure on EBITDA if the revenue trend continues to sit in that mid-teens level, particularly given that you have won the Auckland Transport contract? I would suspect that is a contract which is slightly lower margin.
Yeah, look, it is slightly lower on the Auckland contract. Look, with QMS, we are very pleased with the acquisition. First quarter, we had a good performance. We see double-digit growth continuing. We have the Auckland rollout going, but also we have Metcash coming online from September, October. That will start to build from there as well. So we see continued growth from that business. That is where we are at. It is a good business, and we are starting to integrate it more and more with Nine and taking some opportunities there as well.
Okay. Thanks, Matt. And just last one on Stan.
Obviously, you are guided to growth in 2027. I am just curious how you think about the ongoing inflation of the cost base. Firstly, I would love you to answer that in two steps, into 2027 and then beyond, particularly once it comes to renewal of the Premier League rights and the UEFA club competition rights. Because, I assume there will be some step-up. I do not expect you to necessarily give specifics, but how do you think about that step-up? Do you think it will be a bigger step-up into 2028 and what are some of the levers that you have got? Do you think, is there a subscriber opportunity out there or is ARPU the key lever that you can pull?
Yeah, sure. No, we are very pleased obviously with Stan's performance this year. It was a stellar growth coming through a nd some of that helped by the EPL first year of the deal. Not just that, there were some other areas as well that we had. We like the product. We have still got it for another two years under the current contract we have. Yes, we would like to be involved to extend that forward if we can through there, and one would expect that it would be slightly higher given where the Optus situation was, and we took advantage of that. But there are opportunities and levers still to increase EBITDA through this, and we have that both through volume of subscribers and pricing as well. So we are well-placed with Stan going forward, and there is good levers we can do to continue the growth pattern.
Okay. Thanks, Matt.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Ailsa Lei with UBS. Please go ahead.
Morning, Matt and Martyn. I've got three questions. If I just do one by one. Firstly, just a question on the new ad tier on Stan. Could you please talk through the thought process around the product features, your expectations for ARPU impact in the short and long term, as well as the subscriber mix in terms of trade down versus new?
Yep. Do you want me to answer them one? I'll go one by one if that's how you want. Yeah, the new ad tier. Well, we did the Stan Sport ad tier in FY 2026. That's worked very well. We're very pleased with that and how we went about that. More of a sponsorship-type ad tier. If you like, not really spots and dots you'd have on traditional TV. That's worked well. On August 1st, we launched our entertainment ad tier, and we took the price down from AUD 12 for the base tier down to AUD 10 for the new ad tier. Now, the people on AUD 12 just reverted back down to AUD 10. We have ads going through there. They're selling well at this point in time. We have seen a bit of trade up from those on AUD 12 up a tier as well, going through.
Until we get through the next couple of months though, we can't really work through the churn of them. When we do our maths on it, we look at what is the elasticity, will we get more volume through, and what will the revenue side be. We sort of thought the AUD 2 down is sort of net flat for us, but we'll see and we'll adapt as we go for it. But so far, so good on it. Next one.
Wonderful. Then just on my second question on QMS, the new Metcash retail media partnership you've previously announced. Given the initial is for 860 screens against the potential 3,000+ retail locations they have, could you please just give us some color on what potentially needs to happen or maybe a timeline for this to occur?
Yeah. So look, we'll start with the 860, as you say and roll those out, and then we'll go through a process and see how they're working. Obviously, some stores will be different to other stores, whether they be a liquor store, grocery stores, or hardware stores as well, and how they exactly work. It won't work potentially on everything. But we'll review the performance of those with Metcash and Metcash working closely with them, decide on what is the appropriate level of rollout for there. So there's no real timeline on that. There's no steps where we have to take. I think we're very focused now. Because I think the launch is in September. Early September, so we're looking to get those out as quick as possible. Then we'll review as we go and with Metcash and decide what they want to do. Third question?
Yep, understood. On my last question, on the cost-out program, wondering how much of what is left for FY 2027 is already locked in versus identified. If you could give us a sense of how much of that savings we can expect to drop down to EBITA versus reinvested back.
Yeah, okay. It is difficult to give an exact. I do not really want to give an exact number. What I would say is we are ahead of where we said we were going to be, and we will deliver that. We pretty much identified the buckets of areas of where we will look to get that from. I think, though the reality is we are in a continuous change moment in media, and I think we continue to evolve our business model in all our divisions. They will all change and work, and some will work together closely as well to be more efficient and effective. At this point in time, I think you are going to see continuous us change, continuous where we will take some cost out of the business, but also reinvest around where the growth areas are. You cannot say it is just going to be one number and that is it.
It will be a continuum as we change and evolve the businesses.
Perfect. Thank you.
Thank you.
Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone. The next question comes from Fraser McLeish with MST Marquee. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks. Hi, Matt, Martyn. There's obviously a bit going on. So, I actually got a few questions, if that's all right. But just if you could Matt, talk a bit about BVOD, and how you're going with improving your monetization of BVOD. I think in the second half, your BVOD revenues were up 5% or something, which is obviously better, but audiences are growing a lot more than that. It still feels like you're under-monetizing BVOD. I'll maybe just ask that one first. Thanks.
Yeah, sure. No, you're right. I think we are under-monetizing BVOD. I think that's absolutely right. We were up 5% second half, as you said. Don't forget, the market was pretty soft, especially that fourth quarter for us. So April, May, June, the market was pretty soft. We had 5% growth, but the issue we have that we're working through of how do we monetize that more is really down to the sell-through rate that we're getting on BVOD. That is an important point, and we need to improve the sell-through rate. There's a few things we're working through at this point in time. The first thing probably to say is around frequency capping. Frequency capping on BVOD is very different to free-to-air, and actually is more restricted on BVOD, so we're looking to unleash that a little bit.
So that will be a material impact if we do that. The second thing is around co-viewing, which I know we have mentioned a few times before. But the co-viewing, we do measure now co-viewing. In digital, don't forget, it measures on a one-to-one basis versus TV's more of a one to one point something basis as people watch it. We are working on the co-viewing area as well. So that is something we are measuring now, and we will look to change. Third area around SMEs, a market we have not been in, so we will look to go through there. We are not going to switch that on overnight. I want to be clear. We will do that over a period of time. So we will start to see some benefits coming through the back end of FY 2027, but into FY 2028 and 2029.
One of the big enablers we have talked about, and it is something actually we are doing with Seven West Media at the moment is this joint venture on the DSP, and that is our inventory pipelines. To get that will make it more transparent for us to be able to trade on BVOD. So there is a number of strategies we have got in place. There is no silver bullet, but we have got some really good opportunities, and we think longer term. We are in a really good place to improve that sell-through rate and take more money out of that digital video market.
Great. That is helpful. Thanks. My next one was just on News Media Bargaining Code incentive. I think the press is talking about it is being aimed at generating AUD 250 million, sort of similar to the previous legislation that was there or the current legislation, and that the potential to split sort of four ways, roughly 25% would be around AUD 60 million is potentially for Nine. Is that your understanding of the numbers?
Look, I have to be very careful from a commercial point of view. Obviously, Fraser on this one. Look, there is a lot of work to be done. We are very pleased with the situation where we are at. As in is now we have got a framework that we can work through. Obviously, we are very keen to do deals with the tech companies, so we will be very proactive from that point of view. If we do not go through a deal, then the charge comes into place through there, and there will be mechanisms we have. I think, rough I would be sort of assuming, when we get through the first year, because the first year. Don't forget, we will have a catch-up because it is backdated down to 1st of January 2025. So there will be a backdating in the first year.
Once you get through that first year, one expects pretty much where we were probably before when we had the Google and the Meta deals in our P&L. That would probably be about the right sort of level to assume, going forward.
The other thing I would add, Fraser is that obviously that pool would only exist if people do not do deals. Obviously we are trying to do a deal with Google, et cetera, so therefore that would take that out. I think to just say it is going to be divided by four, that is not really how it is going to work, because I think there is already a 10% deduction to go to regional
There is, yeah.
press, and it is based on the spend on core news going forward. So I think if it was a big pool, 25% would be higher than what I think we would anticipate in terms of what we would get through from that.
Yeah, great. That's helpful. Just a couple of quick ones Martyn, for you. The CapEx you've guided to for next for 2027, AUD 150 million - AUD 170 million. Are you able to just roughly split that down into outdoor and other? Is that your kind of normal CapEx number going forward now, do you think, or is 2027 still a bit of an elevated year?
Well, within that number, it's about AUD 35 million for QMS. I think what we've said is we'd like to spend more because the return on investment certainly on the QMS deals that we've seen so far have a very good return on investment. So that's what the plan currently in terms of current contracts and sites. We're obviously looking for new contracts, new sites, et cetera, so that may increase. The rest is across the board, so TV's about 25, publishing about 25, and the rest is tech investment that we've got going on through the business. I think what we've seen, though, in the past, it's just come up to 12 months for me now is that whatever we've guided, we've probably traditionally underspen and we'll try and get better value for our money going forward. So put QMS to one side.
I'd say that's at the top end of where we'll end up, and then we'd like to spend more on QMS if we could.
Great. Thanks. Sorry, one last one. Just that net debt number, I didn't quite catch the prepayment thing and stuff that's going on with that. If you strip that out, what's your actual sort of pro forma net or adjusted net debt? Thanks.
Yeah. The prepayment was basically to avoid us having franking credit tax, because we would've been in a franking credit deficit. That payment was about AUD 105 million. It represents roughly about two years of PAYG tax, so it's essentially a prepayment of tax. If you think our gearing was at 1.7 times at the end, absent that payment we would've been about 1.5 times. But we'll obviously get the benefit of that in the next two years because we'll have prepaid our tax so that you won't see hopefully any tax payments in the next two years' cash flow. Does that make sense?
Yeah. If you net the-- You're going to get capital gains tax, or sorry, you've prepaid. You've got some refunds, then you've got that. If you compared your net debt sort of adjusted basis to what you previously said, what would your net debt be?
We'll take AUD 105 million off it, basically. That was the prepayment.
Okay. Fair enough. Thanks.
Thanks very much.
There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Matt Stanton for closing remarks.
Thank you. Well, thanks very much. Well, that wraps up the results briefing. Thank you for your attendance, and we will see you again at our half year results briefing in February. Thank you.