Billboards are growing very slowly and other sectors are growing fast.  That’s how you can summarize JCDecaux’s 2023 financials.  Here are the results from the JCDecaux 2023 earnings release.  We have translated the financials from euros to dollars using today’s exchange rate of 1 euro to 1.095 dollars.

• Total revenue increased 7.6% to $3.8 billion during 2023.  North American revenue grew 6% to $312 million during 2023.  The company’s growth was primarily in non-billboard units (street furniture and transport).  Billboard Insider suspects this is because these sectors are making up lost ground during covid.  Billboards grew less than 1%.
• The company’s adjusted EDITDA declined 12% to $1.2billion.  The company’s EBIDTA margin is a low 34% due to the fact that most of the company’s business involved low margin street furniture and transit contracts.
• The company spent $388 million on capexp during 2023.
• Debt totaled $1.1 billion.  Debt/Cashflow(EBIDTA) is a low 1.1 times.

JCDecaux Chairman and CEO Jean-Francois Decaux on first quarter growth:

As far as Q1 2024 is concerned, we now expect an organic revenue growth rate at around +9% driven by strong digital revenues with a double-digit organic revenue growth rate in our transport business and a high single-digit organic revenue growth rate in street furniture.

Billboard Insider’s take:  JCDecaux has gone big into worldwide transit and street furniture at a time when the US out of home companies are shedding their international assets (e.g. OUTFRONT selling Canada and Clear Channel selling Europe and Latin America).  Hard to get enthused about JCDecaux’s far-flung, hard to understand basket of low margin assets.  The market seems to agree.  JCDecaux closed down 9% for the day.  The company is down 22% for the last 12 months and down 34% for the past five years.

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