• by Wayne Friedman , August 2, 2011

Advertising revenues at CBS grew 3% in its second-quarter period of 2011 -- despite better ad results from higher revenues for the 2010 NCAA's Men's Basketball Tournament.

CBS says the higher revenues of a year ago were partly due to higher political advertising that went into the March basketball event. In addition, CBS says with its new shared agreement with Turner Broadcasting to air the event, lower revenues were anticipated from the sporting event, but higher profitability.

Still, CBS says advertising revenues were at $2.22 billion for the second-quarter 2011 period versus $2.16 billion in the second quarter 2010.

Overall CBS revenues were up 8% to $3.59 billion -- with big gains of 12% made from affiliate and subscription fees, as well as new retrans revenues that CBS stations are getting from cable operators and other TV retail programmers.

Net earnings more than doubled to $395 million from $150 million, while operating income before interest, depreciation, and amortization rose 69% to $734 million. CBS' earnings results beat Wall Street estimates.

CBS credits strong profit-margin growth in almost every division -- as well as lower programming costs due to the new NCAA Tournament agreement.

After a rocketing strong business in 2010, CBS stations showed more moderate revenue growth, moving up 2% to $691 million from $678 million -- much of this due to higher comparisons of a year ago when strong TV political advertising was in force. CBS' outdoor advertising business continued at a moderate growth rate -- climbing 7% to $490 million.

Licensing revenue for its TV shows -- domestically and internationally, traditional and digital -- showed major strength, up 21% to $889 million in revenue. CBS credits a number of new digital deals for its content -- ones that have been made with Amazon and Netflix. It also notes stronger results from a new cycle of sales of "Frasier" reruns.