It's quite something when a six month loss of £105m is considered surprisingly good news, but that's how I felt this morning when I saw ITV's interim results.
Given the state of the economy, the ad market plus the absurd restrictions and regulations that the broadcaster is restrained by I expected it to be much worse.
What's more ITV has finally managed to off-load that absurd Charles Allen-inherited purchase FriendReunited for £25m, which may be £140m less than its former management team paid for it but still seemed to be quite a good price considering nobody uses it anymore.
So, for the time being at least, ITV hopefully won't need to go cap in hand to Lord Mandy of Rio to seek a publicly-funded bail-out. What it does need though is a loosening of the regulatory noose, as well as a smaller BBC, and this is the challenge for its incoming chief executive.
It's just a shame that this long-awaited announcement was not forthcoming.
Given how Sky has been so successful in influencing government policy in its favour in the past, I really hope that its former chief executive Tony Ball gets the job in order for this to happen.
