Media is one of my favorite sector when comes to stock and television 18 best stock. The things have been very volatile lately in Indian media space. Companies are having difficult time to manage through it and make profits. Number one reason being high competition and more number of players in market. It takes a lot to get audience.

Number 1 source of revenue for media is advertising. After a slump ad spending is increasing and that definitely beneficial but is it sufficient enough to justify a p/e of 60 for some stocks.

1. TV 18

Key Business: CNBC tv18 , CNBC Awaz are leaders in business news. Infomedia 18 is publishing Forbes magazine in india.  Web18 is having strong presence in finance portals with moneycontrol.

Where is company loosing money ? 

Number one is news media. Where it lost around 300 million Rs. of which 250 million was in interest cost.

Web 18 is on operating loss.

So the key question , does it make sense to invest in television 18. 
I think if I am looking for value than I would stay out of TV 18. But if I am looking for growth in longer range.It's a good stock to be in. No other company can match business publication and news bredtth of TV18 and as companies starts to spend money on advertising TV 18 will take chunk of it.
Remember that Company is loaded with 900 cr of debt and no earning in current year apart from market cap visible.

2. Reliance Mediaworks

What tv18 is in business news media same is true for reliance mediaworkds ( Adlabs ) in general entertainment. They are vertically integrated media house with presence in content development, distribution to multiplexes.  Company is still trying to digest monetary impact of  acquisitions it did in last 2 years.

I would strongly recommend owning this stock for 5 year portfolio.

Jagran Prakashan

Jagran is king in hindi readership and UP belt while there are competitors there is huge entry barrier when it comes to print media. Same may not be true for electronic media. Setting up websites or TV channel is easier compared to setting up a newspaper.

Jagran has been profitable all along and only other one closer to it is DB corp.