Seven West Media has this morning announced a profit in the first six months to December 31 of $135.2 million. Seven West Media owns the Seven Network, Pacific Magazines and West Australian newspapers.

The result was a $1 billion-plus turnaround from the year previous when it announced a $934.6 million loss following write-downs to its TV and newspaper businesses.

The profit came despite actual revenues slipping year on year by 4.1 per cent but were achieved by cost cutting across entire group. Seventy-four per cent of the profit came from its TV business despite a sluggish advertising market.

The Seven Network remains Australia’s number one station for both ratings and profitability.

It’s chief executive Tim Worner said: “Today’s result in an extraordinarily competitive and rapidly changing market is positive. We are delivering leadership in broadcast television, and our digital and publishing businesses continue to deliver market-leading margins.

“We will continue to invest in our content and our businesses. We will continue to be rigorous in our cost management. We will also accelerate our moves into new forms of delivery to audiences building on the success of our live streaming, our PLUS7 presence and our Presto partnership with Foxtel.”

“We are building and transforming our businesses, managing our costs, focusing on our core strength of content creation and rapidly expanding our presence across all communications devices.”

Worner said he expected the TV ad market to be relatively flat again in 2016 and the ad market for its magazines “to continue in line with current trends” (which is downwards).

“Seven continues to lead the market in television advertising revenue share in a tough advertising market. The latest industry figures put Seven’s share of the advertising revenue market at 38.5 per cent for the July-December half year and 39 per cent across the 2015 calendar year,” Worner said.