Russian broadcasting has had something of a roller-coaster ride this past couple of years, hurt badly by the advertising downturn, and CTC Media (Russia-based but NASDAQ registered) has seen its share-price suffer commensurately as revenues slumped. CTC operates two national free-to-air networks in Russia (CTC and Domashny, and DTV) with others in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Last Friday (Aug 5) its management reported much improved figures for 2011, with underlying growth up from 16 percent in Q1 to an impressive 28 per cent for Q2. Now, with 90 per cent of revenues pre-sold CTC’s senior staff were able to firm up on their revenue guidance for 2011 with around 20 per cent growth for the year and overall margins of 34-36 per cent. In a report to investors bankers Morgan Stanley say they are maintaining $25 as a target price for CTC’s stock for next year.

The bank’s report says CTC Media is an attractive way to play the long-term growth of Russian consumers. “It has an excellent position in the Russian advertising market that we expect to be one of the fastest [growing] globally.”

In May CTC expanded a US service in partnership with Time Warner, reaching about 175,000 viewers across the USA..

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