UPDATE 1-Mediaset CEO sees better 2010 advertising revenues

MILAN, Nov 16 (Reuters) - Italian broadcaster Mediaset will post better advertising revenues in 2010 than in 2009, the group's Chief Executive said on Monday. The mainly free-to-air TV broadcaster, owned by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, said on occasion of its nine-month results in November the decline in Italian advertising will narrow in the fourth quarter. "We are not out of the crisis yet but the last part of 2009 is better than the rest of the year and 2010 will be better than this particularly difficult year," CEO Giuliano Adreani said on the sidelines of a conference on Monday. In the first ten months of the year Mediaset's advertising revenues fell 10.2 percent. "We will close the year much better than the market, we will be among the leaders in Europe," he said. In a conference call on nine-month results, Mediaset unit Publitalia Managing Director Luigi Colombo said advertising revenues in the final quarter could be down around 2 percent to 2.5 percent. The advertising revenues of publishers across Europe have been severely tested by the global recession. Adreani said Mediaset does not need to issue a bond in the immediate future. "We are evaluating a series of situations, we analysed this possibility but there is no decision," he said. In October Mediaset Chairman Fedele Confalonieri said a possible bond issue was "on the chief financial officer's desk." Mediaset shares closed the Monday session up 1.04 percent at 4.867 euros. (Reporting by Gianluca Semeraro, writing by Stephen Jewkes; Editing Bernard Orr) (([e-mail]; [phone]; Reuters Messaging: [e-mail]@reuters.net) Keywords: MEDIASET ADVERTISING/ COPYRIGHT Copyright Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.

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