Revenue during the quarter grew 26.52 percent to $693.84 million from $548.40 million in the previous year period. Total expenses were 77.81 percent of quarterly revenues, down from 81.84 percent for the same period last year. This has led to an improvement of 403 basis points in operating margin to 22.19 percent.

Operating income for the quarter was $153.99 million, compared with $99.61 million in the previous year period.

"Although industry political ad spending for 2016 has not been at the levels anticipated coming into the year due to the unique nature of this year’s presidential election and certain contested senate races not materializing, our core advertising nonetheless grew slightly in the third quarter, despite the crowding-out impact of political on our normal advertisers," commented David Smith, president and chief executive officer of Sinclair. "We continued opportunistic share repurchases to capitalize on what we believe to be a discount in our stock. Year-to-date, we have repurchased almost 4.5 million shares or 6.5% of the float. Combined with our full year quarterly dividends and scheduled debt amortization, return of capital to shareholders and debt repayments would represent almost half of our expected discretionary 2016 cash flow."