Sinclair, Inc.

Greetings and welcome to the Sinclair Broadcast Group's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are placed on a listen-only mode and a question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. And please note, this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Chris King, Vice President of Investor Relations. The floor is yours.

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining Sinclair's third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. Joining me on the call today are Chris Ripley, our President and Chief Executive Officer, Narendra Sahai, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, and Rob Weisbord, our Chief Operating Officer and President of Local Media. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone that slides for today's earnings call are available on our website, sbgi.net, on the events and presentations page of the investor relations portion of the site. A webcast replay will remain available on our website until our next quarterly earnings release. Certain matters discussed on this call may include forward-looking statements regarding, among other things, future operating results. Such statements are subject to several risks and uncertainties. Actual results in the future could differ from those described in the forward-looking statements because of various important factors. Such factors have been set forth in the company's most recent reports as filed with the SEC and and included in our third quarter earnings release. The company undertakes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Included on the call will be a discussion of non-GAAP financial measures, specifically adjusted EBITDA. These measures are not formulated in accordance with GAAP, are not meant to replace GAAP measurements, and may differ from other companies' uses or formulations. Further discussions and reconciliations of the company's non-GAAP financial measures to comparable GAAP financial measures can be found on our website. Please note that unless otherwise noted, all year-rear comparisons throughout today's call are presented on an as-reported basis. Let me now turn the call over to Chris Ripley.

Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Let me begin on slide three with our third quarter results. We delivered strong performance and met or exceeded guidance across all key metrics. Total revenue of $773 million came in higher than the high end of our guidance range. Core revenues was up 7% year-over-year on an as-reported basis. Most notably, adjusted EBITDA of $100 million exceeded the high end of our guidance range. This reflects our operational discipline and continued focus on cost management across the business. Turning to slide four, I'm pleased to report significant progress on our station portfolio optimization within our broadcast segment, which drives immediate operational efficiencies. As of today, 11 partner station acquisitions have closed. Twelve have received SEC approval and are awaiting final closing. Ten are filed and pending SEC approval, and we plan to file several additional partner station acquisitions by year-end. Once all current and planned partner station acquisitions are completed, we expect to generate at least $30 million in incremental annualized adjusted EBITDA with minimal upfront capital requirements. We expect to reach the full run-right EBITDA benefit by second half of 2026. Moving to slide five, I want to address the evolving regulatory landscape and its impact on our industry. Recent decisions by the FCC and federal court rulings have created a more constructive M&A environment for broadcasters. The elimination of restrictions on Big Four local market ownership enables highly accretive consolidation opportunities that were not possible before. We anticipate the SEC may raise or eliminate the 39% nationwide ownership cap in the first half of 2026, which would further remove barriers to value-creating transactions. These regulatory changes came at a critical time. The broadcast sector is facing secular challenges within linear TV while having a unique opportunity for significant consolidations. We believe the industry is at an inflection point where scale and operational efficiency will increasingly separate high performing companies from the rest. Against this backdrop, in mid-August, we launched a strategic review of our broadcast business and an evaluation of a potential separation of ventures to optimize value creation across our portfolio. Under the new regulatory regime, we have already executed several transactions, including partner station acquisitions and select acquisitions and divestitures. Given the magnitude of the opportunity ahead, let me spend a moment discussing what broader industry consolidation could potentially look like and why we believe it represents a transformational opportunity for the sector. The broadcast sector is ripe for consolidation given the various secular and economic challenges we collectively face. Based on our analysis and industry benchmarking, synergies from broadcast combinations typically come from three primary sources, distribution revenue optimization, corporate overhead rationalization, and the creation of multi-station markets were permitted. One potential path for industry evolution could involve consolidating into two similarly sized scale broadcast groups, creating another group comparable in size to the large broadcast combination announced in August, could unlock an estimated $600 to $900 million in annual synergies through mergers and subsequent portfolio optimizations. This level of consolidation would strengthen the industry's financial footing and position broadcasters as more capable competitors to big media and big tech. Equally important, it would help safeguard local, independent, and diverse news coverage that communities across the country rely on. While we present this as one potential industry scenario rather than a prediction, the fundamental point is clear. The regulatory environment now enables transformational consolidation that can benefit broadcast group shareholders, creditors, employees, and the communities we serve. Sinclair is well positioned in this environment, and we're actively evaluating how best to participate to maximize value for our stakeholders. Let me now turn the call over to Rob to discuss our political revenue outlook and provide an update on EdgeBeam before we turn it over to Rinder. to review their financial results and provide the outlook for the business.