Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. During this conference call, Urban One will be sharing with you certain projections or other forward-looking statements regarding future events or its future performance. Urban One cautions you that certain factors, including risks and uncertainties referred to in the 10-Ks, 10-Qs, and other reports it periodically files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, could cause the company's actual results to differ materially from those indicated by its projections or forward-looking statements. This call will present information as of January 11, 2024. Please note that Urban One disclaims any duty to update any forward-looking statements made in the presentation. In this call, Urban One may also discuss some non-GAAP financial measures in talking about its performance.
These measures will be reconciled to GAAP, either during the course of this call or in the company's press release, which can be found on its website at www.urbanone.com. A replay of this conference call will be available from 1:00 P.M. Eastern Time, January 11th, 2024, until 11:59 P.M., January 18th, 2024. Callers may access the replay by calling 866-207-1041, or international callers may dial direct 402-970-0847. The replay access code is 2318685. Access to live audio and a replay of the conference call will also be available on Urban One's corporate website at www.urbanone.com. The replay will be made available on the website for seven days after the call.
No other recordings or copies of this call are authorized or may be relied upon. I'll now turn the call over to Alfred C. Liggins, Chief Executive Officer of Urban One, who is joined by Peter D. Thompson, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Also joining, Peter and I are, our Chief Administrative Officer, Karen Wishart, our General Counsel, Chris Simpson, and the Chief Financial Officer for TV One, Jody Dreher. We have released our third quarter results, did so before the end of the year, so that's been out there, and we're obviously doing the conference call now. You know, a little bit of news that's already, you know, out there, I think we kinda, you know, guided as to where we were gonna be, you know, for the year-end, third quarter for us, you know, as well as the rest of the radio sector, you know, an awful quarter. Yeah, ours wasn't any different.
The fourth quarter, you know, we had huge political, you know, that's kind of, you know, same station, you know, ex-political, kinda in line with with third quarter, you know, as well. But, yeah, net-net, we still, you know, are affirming our year-end guidance of $125 to almost, you know, $128. You know, yeah, we're, you know, still on top of that, comfortable, you know, with that as we, you know, finish tying out the year-end results. Good news going into 2024. In the radio sector, Q1 radio pacings are substantially better, bolstered a lot by improving local. Currently, for us, we're, you know, pacing, you know, low single digits. Today, it's, it bounces around, but today, it's -1 for Q1.
You know, we'll see, you know, how that looks and holds. But, we're optimistic as we go into 2024 for a bottoming, you know, if you will, in radio advertising performance and then an upswing due to political. So with that, I'm gonna turn it over to Peter, let him get into the detail of the numbers, and then we'll come back for Q&A.
Thank you, Alfred. Net revenue is down by 2.8% year-over-year for the quarter ended September 30th, 2023, at approximately $170.8 million. Net revenue for the radio segment was $40.2 million, a decrease of 0.6% year-over-year. And we were down by 14.4%, same station, and -12% same station ex-political, which, as Alfred said, is broadly in line with what we discussed on our last earnings call. According to Miller Kaplan, our local ad sales were down 8.4% against the market that was down 5.7% for the quarter, and our national ad sales were down 7% against the market that was down 10.5%.
Q4 2023 radio segment is expected to be down approximately 14% all-in. On a same-station basis, Q4 is expected to be down approximately 23% and then, ex-political, down about 13%, so broadly, kinda in line with Q3 same-station as well. And Q1 pacings on a same-station basis, currently down very low single digits. Local is pacing +4%, national is down about 20%. Net revenue for Reach Media was $11.2 million in the third quarter, up 10.8% over prior year, and Adjusted EBITDA was $3.4 million, down 6.7% for the quarter. Net revenues for our digital segment decreased by 3% in Q3 to $20.4 million. Direct sales were down, while local radio, streaming, and podcast revenues were all up.
Adjusted EBITDA was $7.4 million, down $7.4 million, down 2.9% year-over-year. We recognized approximately $46.8 million of revenue from our cable television segment during the quarter, decreased 7.6%. Cable TV advertising revenue was down 5.9%, where we had a favorable rate impact of $1.1 million, unfavorable volume impact of $1.2 million, $500,000 unfavorable audience deficiency units, and an $850,000 reclass of VOD revenue to our digital segment related to CTV. Cable TV affiliate revenue was down by 9.3%, with favorable rate increases of $1.2 million being offset by $3.4 million of net churn.
Cable subscribers for TV One, as measured by Nielsen, finished Q3 2023 at 44 million, compared to 45.1 million at the end of Q2, and Cleo TV had 41.4 million Nielsen subs. Operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization, stock-based compensation and impairments of long-lived assets, increased to approximately $84.5 million for the quarter, up 5.3% from the approximately $80.2 million incurred for the comparable period in 2022. Radio operating expenses were up 14.1% or $3.9 million. The Houston radio acquisition, which was effective August 1st, 2023, that added approximately $2.2 million to expense, and also the Indianapolis radio acquisition, which we did back in September of 2022, added approximately $2 million of incremental expense.
On a same-station basis, sales commission expenses were down and event expenses were down from last year for the quarter, due to the timing difference between for two of the largest radio events for the company. Reach operating expenses were up by 21.4%. That was, that was driven by increased Reach net station compensation expense, given the addition of four new networks, as well as event expenses and talent compensation. Operating expenses in the digital segment were down 3%, driven predominantly by variable sales expenses tied to lower direct advertising revenues. Cable TV expenses were down 4.4% year-over-year. Content Amortization expense was up by $1.7 million, driven by an increase of $2.2 million for original programming.
That increase was offset slightly by a reduction in promotional media spend, actually $3.1 million, considering that we had a greater number of premiere hours that we promoted in prior year. Operating expenses in the corporate elimination segment were up by approximately $520,000, primarily as a result of higher third-party consulting and audit expenses. Consolidated Adjusted EBITDA was $34.1 million for the quarter, down 23%. For the third quarter, consolidated Broadcast and Digital Operating Income was approximately $43.8 million, a decrease of 13.9%. Interest expense decreased to approximately $14 million for Q3, down from $15.3 million last year due to lower overall debt balances.
Company made cash interest payments of approximately $26.9 million in the quarter, and the next semiannual debt service payment is due in Q1. An $85.4 million impairment of goodwill, intangible assets, and long-lived assets was recorded across 10 of our 13 radio markets. The benefit from income taxes was approximately $16.8 million for the quarter, and the company paid cash income taxes in the amount of approximately $1.6 million. Net loss was approximately $54.4 million or $1.14 per share, compared to net income of $3.5 million or $0.07 per share for the third quarter of 2022. Capital expenditures were approximately $2.5 million for the quarter.
As of September 30, 2023, total gross debt was $725 million. Our ending unrestricted cash was $195.7 million, resulting in net debt of approximately $529.3 million, which we compare to $133.3 million of LTM reported adjusted EBITDA, for a total net leverage ratio of 3.97x. Pro forma for the Indianapolis and Houston radio acquisitions, total net leverage was 3.93x. With that, I'll hand it back to you, Alfred.
Thank you, Peter. Operator, could you open it up to the callers for Q&A, please?
Okay, ladies and gentlemen, if you'd like to ask a question, please press one then zero on your telephone keypad. You may withdraw your question at any time by repeating the one-zero command. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up the handset before pressing the numbers. Once again, if you have a question, please press one, then zero at this time. One moment, please, for your first question. Your first question comes from the line of Hal Steiner from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Congratulations on the quarter and coming in line with expectations. Great to see the, you know, affirmation of the guide for the year. I guess, you know, one thing that really stuck out to me was I thought the Q1 pacings for radio were much stronger than I would have expected. You know, you speak to local being stronger, which is fantastic. Is that really just a reflection of the economy improving and people are stepping back in and being willing to advertise again? And I guess my little two-parter on that is just sort of, you know, for the year, with sort of that pacing, do you think—should we be thinking that overall radio revenue should be up year-over-year with political?
Yeah, the answer to that is yes. And look, I would, you know, I definitely feel like we've gone through an ad recession, 2023. I mean, we felt it. We felt it, I mean, you could really see it in national, right? You know, advertisers pulling back. We saw it across all of our businesses. So, you know, not one of them was not affected, from television, to radio, to digital. So just because there's an ad recession doesn't necessarily mean there is, you know, indeed, a macroeconomic recession. So the recession that never materializes, or a soft landing or whatever you, you know, you wanna call it.
You know, so, like, I'm not, you know, I'm not good at sort of, you know, predicting, you know, why, you know, economic advertising trends move in one direction, you know, or another. But it, you know, definitely does feel like, you know, you kind of bottomed out in the third and fourth quarter. I'm hearing it from other operators that that business in Q1 looks better. And, you know, I think the tenor, you know, around the country, you know, seems much more, you know, optimistic in terms of whether or not, you know, we're gonna have a soft landing.
You know, so, you know, my guess is, yeah, yeah, things are, you know, bottoming out and, and are, are improving, and, and that's indicative of, you know, what's happening with our radio stations right now. Again, that's my opinion, you know, but that's what it feels like. Actually, I had a conversation with one of our sales managers, who handles, you know, national political, you know, stuff for us. We're starting to see more political avails, you know, coming in. Those should also... You know, there's not a ton of political money in that Q1 number right now, you know. I mean, I thought it was maybe $150,000 or something like that, you know, but we're starting to see it, you know, see it heat up.
So, you know, hopefully, again, that's a good sign for things to come for the year.
Yeah, great. No, absolutely. I mean, that is fantastic. I mean, the data itself is certainly irrefutable. So anyway, I guess moving on to my next question is, I mean, with all of that, I guess I would think then that it would be right to... And I know you're not putting out any guidance yet for 2024, but sort of with that backdrop, I mean, certainly there probably will still be some sub-pressure on TV, but overall, I mean, wouldn't you guys sort of be maybe disappointed at this point if EBITDA was flat for the year in 2024? I would think that there would probably be some room for a little bit of improvement year- over- year.
We're not there yet, but you look, you said you called out the single biggest headwind, and you know, and that's the pay TV ecosystem and churn in double digits, you know, sub decline. You know, yeah, those are difficult to deal with, you know? We're not prepared to give a 2024 number yet. We're still working through budgets. Yeah, honestly, you know, seeing this momentum in the radio business, you know, is helpful to our mindset, but we're not ready to, you know, plant a stake in the ground as to, you know, to where we're gonna land.
That makes sense, Alfred. That's definitely a prudent, and I appreciate the conservatism, you know, but respect the strong performance. And I'll just say one last question, and I guess I'll go back into the queue. And thank you, guys, of course, for the time. But I guess I just wanted to say, so for the debt paydown, we have been talking about that, you know, before, and I think on the last call, you had said you're pretty much restricted from doing anything until the last 10-Q was posted. I mean, so now that that's done, have you started to buy back any of the bonds yet in the open market in 4Q or 1Q?
Just asking that, and just any and then if there's any update on the sizing of the buyback or what you think-
Yes.
-you'll target.
Yeah. The answer is yes, we are active in the market now.
That's great.
Yep.
Great. Any update on the overall sizing of what you think-
Uh-
you could be targeting?
I think I've said on the call before that, you know, you know... Did I? I think we talked about it, right? I kind of try and-
We did.
Yeah, yeah, we tend to look at, like, you know, our bond buybacks in kind of $25 million tranches. We, you know, I think we got an authorization from our board for $75 million just because we kinda liked the round, you know, number of 650 in terms of face amount of debt to go down to, you know, next. And so, you know, that's what we did. We've got that authorization. We kinda, you know, look at, you know, $25 million tranches and then kind of pause and see where we're at. And, you know, that's been our... You know, that's kind of been our game plan, you know? And that's what we're doing, so.
... Great. Thank you guys so much for the questions, and congratulations again.
You're welcome. Thanks.
If there are any additional questions, please press one then zero. You have a question from the line of Brad Kern, a private investor. Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks for taking my call. First of all, I wanted to see if there was any update on the way you're thinking about capital deployment in terms of strategic investments, and I don't know if you can maybe share what you're seeing out there in terms of opportunities that you're vetting for other use of the cash on balance sheet.
Uh-
Second of all, there was. I'll start with that. Go ahead.
Yeah, there is no strategic investment decisions currently being vetted at the company right now. We've got, you know, we've got nothing on the table. You know, you know, we're not exploring. We're not working on an acquisition. We still are, you know, active in trying to figure out, you know, future gaming opportunities, but there is nothing actionable today. And so the number one use of capital right now is what I just described to the last, you know, caller's question. And that's it, you know, you know, you know, really boring, you know, delevering and operating and, you know, strategically trying to figure out what to, you know, you know, do with these businesses. You know, where do we take our cable television business?
You know, what are our next distribution opportunities? That stuff's changing so fast. Yeah, like, I feel good that we're sitting back, and we have, you know, we have breathing room, you know, to you know, to figure out where the puck's going and try to skate there and continue to, you know, work on delevering at the same time, so.
Okay, that's helpful. And then there was some news in December about around Paramount potentially selling, in talks to sell BET to, I think, they're a management-led buyout team, and you had said on a previous call that you were, you were around-
Yeah
kind of the hoop. Is there
I don't, yeah.
The update?
I mean, I saw that news report. I don't, you know, I don't know how real it is. You know, I think, you know, a number of people kind of reached out when they saw that news report and said, "Hey, we're still interested." And, you know, it looks like, you know, Paramount didn't really respond, you know, to that. They seem like they're working on some sort of larger, you know, solution, you know, so I don't know anymore. I mean, you know, we were, you know, there with a bid that was, you know, well lower than the $3 billion that they had, you know, kind of said that they were looking, you know, for.
We, you know, we had a great private equity partner, you know, lined up and ready to go, and we had a couple banks lined up and, you know, ready to, you know, underwrite it, so our bid was real. So I say in all that is that, you know, they know that, you know, we were there, and we were credible, and, you know, we could be actionable. So it would be surprising to me, you know, if they, and again, this is just my opinion, you know, go out and do kind of like a one-off deal without at least calling people that they, you know, that were credible there to create some tension.
If they were gonna decide to sell for a lower number than three and come down to kind of where everybody was at, you know, it would be surprising if we didn't get a call to reengage, you know, and we haven't, you know? So I don't know what's going on there, you know, but it feels like they got bigger fish to fry, right? I think I just saw something either yesterday or the day before, you know, about Skydance and RedBird trying to, you know, take out National Amusements. You know, seems like a larger discussion than whether or not you're gonna spin out BET.
Yeah, absolutely. All right. Thanks for the time.
Sure.
If there are any additional questions, please press one then zero. At this time, there are no further questions.
Great. Well, thank you, everybody. We look forward to speaking with you again on our year-end conference call.
Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT&T Teleconference. You may now disconnect.