TheStreet.com Reports First-Quarter 2006 Financial Results; Net Revenue Increases 43 Percent over Prior Year; Net Income and Earnings Per Share Reach Quarterly Record

Business Wire, April 25, 2006

NEW YORK -- TheStreet.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: TSCM), a leading provider of financial commentary, analysis and news, today announced its financial results for the first quarter 2006, which included a net revenue increase of 43%. In addition, the Company reported a net income increase of $3.4 million over the prior year's loss of $0.9 million.

"I am very pleased with our business execution and strong financial performance," said Thomas J. Clarke, Jr., chairman and chief executive officer of TheStreet.com. "With both our advertising and subscription revenue up 54% and 41%, respectively, over the same period a year ago, we look forward to a strong year of performance based on the robust demand for TheStreet.com's increasing range of services."

First-Quarter 2006 Results

--Net income for the quarter was $2.6 million, a $3.4 million improvement over the same period last year and a $0.8 million improvement from last quarter.

--Earnings per a share for the quarter were $0.10, a $0.13 improvement over the same period last year and a $0.03 improvement from last quarter.

--Net revenue was $11.1 million in the first quarter, a 43% increase over the same period last year and a 12% increase from last quarter.

--Total cash flow for the quarter was $5.8 million, a $9.4 million improvement over the ($3.6 million) in cash burn for the same period last year, and a $3.3 million improvement from last quarter's cash flow of $2.5 million.

--Deferred revenue, a key metric of the Company's subscription business performance, was $12.5 million, a 58% increase over the same quarter last year and an increase of 26% from last quarter.

--Cash, restricted cash and marketable securities stood at $39.8 million as of March 31, 2006, a 40% increase over the same period a year ago and a 17% increase from last quarter. The Company has no bank debt.

Revenue Streams

--Subscription revenue for the quarter totaled $7.6 million, a 41% increase over the same period last year and an increase of 17%, or $1.1 million, from last quarter's $6.5 million. The number of paid subscribers to the Company's premium services increased by approximately 13,100, or 15%, during the quarter.

--Advertising revenue for the quarter totaled $3.2 million, a 54% increase over the same period last year and up slightly from last quarter, which historically has been the Company's seasonally strongest quarter for advertising revenue. In the first quarter, page views increased 111% over the year-ago period and 55% from the previous quarter. The total average monthly unique visitors in the quarter were 4.5 million, a 68% increase over the year-ago period and a 31% sequential increase.

--Subscription bookings for the quarter totaled $10.1 million, an increase of 70% over the $6.0 million in the same period last year and an increase of 44% from last quarter's $7.1 million.

Operating Expenses

--First quarter operating expenses were $8.9 million, a 27% increase over the $7.0 million recorded in the same period last year and a 4% increase from last quarter's $8.5 million.

Recent Company Highlights

--On February 21, 2006, TheStreet.com announced that its board of directors had declared the Company's first quarterly cash dividend, payable to all shareholders of record at the close of business on March 10, 2006. The cash dividend of $0.025 per share was paid on March 31, 2006.

--During the first quarter, the Company launched interactive Web logs, or blogs, on one of its paid subscription services - RealMoney - with the intent to build community and user-generated content. During the quarter, we witnessed a large spike in page views on our paid Real Money subscription service, which we believe can be attributed to the launch of blogs in January. The Company is now in the process of adding additional blogs to RealMoney and considering adding blogs to its free site to extend its community-building initiative.

--Several new distribution agreements were signed with firms such as eNews, Congoo, Alphatrade, MarketBrowser, and InvestorsHub/Silicon Investor that the Company expects will be traffic drivers in the future.

--The Company continues to increase the amount of video content it makes available and now offers nine channels with multiple advertising sponsors.

--The Company's podcasting of Jim Cramer's Real Money radio show, which launched in Q4 2005, is starting to pay dividends as seen by the growing numbers of subscribers. The podcast has consistently been ranked #1 or #2 in iTunes Top Business Downloads of the Day and it remains in the top 100 'subscribed' to podcasts for all of iTunes. The Company makes money from these podcasts through the sale of advertisements.

--The Media Industry Newsletter, or min, named the TheStreet.com Options Alerts as the winner of its 2006 Best E-mail Newsletter Award. TheStreet.com Options Alerts (http://www.thestreet.com/k/oa/index.html) is a paid subscription e-mail service that identifies investment opportunities in the options market. The service consists of e-mail alerts that detail potential options trades as they arise and a weekly outlook that details potential options trades for the coming week. TheStreet.com Options Alerts is written by Steven Smith, a former seat-holding member of the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) and the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and a regular contributor to RealMoney, TheStreet.com's paid subscription Web site.