Sharewatch: ITV Rises As Media Stocks Bounce Back

Broadcast heavyweight ITV led media stocks in a resurgence yesterday, rising by 3.44% to close at 97žp as the company unveiled the third key appointment to its advertiser relationships team, part of an ongoing attempt to improve its image by becoming more customer-centric.

The company’s latest appointment of Maria-Isabel Jassies comes just days after Jane Carroll joined ITV Sales from MediaVest and Alex Plumb defected from McCann Erikson. The trio will form the new face of ITV for the broadcaster’s clients as it attempts to forge closer relationships with advertisers (see ITV Sales Recruits Third Agency Account Director).

Elsewhere, consumer magazine and radio giant Emap also saw a rise, climbing by 0.86% ahead of the latest ABC results, released tomorrow. The company is expected to perform well overall, although newly created men’s weekly title Zoo is expected to come second to IPC’s Nuts in the eagerly anticipated circulation reports (see Nuts Could Beat Zoo In Latest Consumer ABC Release).

Embattled satellite provider BSkyB continued to fare poorly yesterday, sliding still further into negative growth with a 1.55% decline to 476˝p. The company continues to reel from shareholder dissent after Sky failed to meet subscriber targets last week (see Sky Profits Rocket Despite Slowing Subscriber Rates).

The FTSE 100 rose by 0.9% yesterday, climbing to 4,350.9, while the FTSE 250 gained 0.7% to rise to 5,875. The markets were buoyant yesterday, with 2.1 billion shares changing hands amongst traders.

The closing prices of media company shares on Tuesday were: