Mixed Earnings for Yell, PagesJaunes

Yell Group saw an 11.3 percent rise in its share value yesterday (to 79 p) following its first-quarter 2009 earnings (its financial year ends March 31) announcement, in which the publisher topped its U.S. guidance, fell a bit short in the U.K. and held steady guidance for Spain and Latin America. Yell continues to trade slightly upward today.

The French publisher PagesJaunes reported its results this morning, showing overall growth of 4.6 percent for the first half of 2008. PagesJaunes was trading down, possibly because it has lowered its full-year guidance for consolidated revenue growth from 5 percent to between 3 percent and 4 percent.

Both publishers were able to offset soft print results with sold online growth, and both also took a cautious outlook given a difficult economic climate.

PagesJaunes saw print results in France drop off 3.6 percent, offset by 21.6 percent IYP growth and 49.1 percent growth in its competitive DA business.

In the U.K., Yell’s print operation declined 7.6 percent for the first quarter, while the U.S. operation, Yellowbook, saw same-book print revenues decline 1.2 percent. Yell U.K.’s total growth for the quarter was (1 percent) while in the U.S., Yellowbook managed top-line organic growth of 4.6 percent, and total growth of 8.3 percent. Yellowbook’s online revenues grew 89 percent. In the U.K., Yell.com grew 27.1 percent, which represents an expected slowing of online revenue growth. For the full financial year 2008, for example, Yell.com grew 45.2 percent.

The Kelsey Report will offer more in-depth analysis of first-half financial results in Client Inquiry Briefs that will be issued beginning next week.