ACCESS Newswire Inc., originally incorporated as Issuer Direct Corporation in 1988, is a communications and compliance company headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina, ...
ACCESS Newswire Inc., formerly Issuer Direct Corporation, is a leading communications and compliance firm headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina. Founded in 1988, the company renamed itself to ACCESS Newswire in January 2025. It serves a diverse clientele, including public and private corporations, mutual funds, law firms, brokerage houses, and investment ...ACCESS Newswire Inc., formerly Issuer Direct Corporation, is a leading communications and compliance firm headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina. Founded in 1988, the company renamed itself to ACCESS Newswire in January 2025. It serves a diverse clientele, including public and private corporations, mutual funds, law firms, brokerage houses, and investment banks, across the United States and internationally.
The company offers a comprehensive suite of products and services through several platforms. Its Media Advantage Platform enables press release distribution, media database access, media monitoring, and custom newsrooms. The ACCESSWIRE service is dedicated to news dissemination and media outreach. For virtual engagement, the Webcaster Platform provides cloud-based webcasting, webinars, and virtual meetings. Additionally, the company provides advanced conference and events software with mobile applications for event management, scheduling, and attendee coordination.
In the compliance aspect, ACCESS Newswire offers a whistleblower hotline for incident reporting and workflow management, a stock transfer module for real-time shareholder information and stock ledgers, and a proxy module for real-time voting. The investor relations content network supplies critical data feeds including news, stock information, financial fundamentals, and regulatory filings.
Financially, the company has a market cap of approximately $20 million and generates revenue mainly from subscription-based services. It has faced some financial challenges, including negative net income and operating margins in recent quarters, but maintains a strong gross profit margin of around 69%. Key executives include CEO and founder Brian R. Balbirnie, who also serves as Chairman, and CFO Steven Knerr. The company focuses on innovation and customer service, aiming to empower brands to connect with their audiences effectively. With 91 employees, it remains a niche player in the communications industry, committed to delivering value-driven solutions for PR and IR professionals.
YoYYoY means Year-over-Year. It compares the latest annual value with the previous annual value to show long-term trend strength.
QoQQoQ means Quarter-over-Quarter. It compares the latest quarter with the immediately previous quarter to show short-term momentum changes.
RevenueThe total money that came through the front door from selling things, before paying a single bill. Think of it as the grand total of every credit card swipe from customers. (YoY compares this year to last year's performance, while QoQ compares the current three months to the previous three).
$22.6M
-1.9%
+5.5%
Net IncomeThe absolute bottom line. If the company paid every single supplier, employee, banker, and tax collector, this is the actual money left in their pocket at the end of the day.
$4.3M
+139.8%
+21.1%
Gross MarginThe basic markup. If they sell a $100 pair of sneakers, this percentage tells you how much of that price tag is profit right after paying for the rubber and shoelaces, but before paying for things like store rent or TV commercials.
+64.7%
-14.5%
+18.0%
Operating MarginThe 'day job' efficiency score. Out of every dollar a customer spends, this shows how many cents the company keeps after making the product AND paying for all the everyday corporate overhead (like salaries, marketing, and keeping the lights on).
-6.0%
+91.5%
+59.5%
Net MarginThe final take-home percentage. When you strip away every conceivable cost, tax, and interest payment, this is the exact number of cents the company truly gets to keep from every dollar in sales.
+19.0%
+140.5%
+25.2%
Free Cash FlowThe holy grail of corporate cash. It's the spendable, physical money left over after the business pays for its daily operations AND buys the big, expensive upgrades (like new factories or servers) it needs to survive. This is the 'free' money they can use to pay dividends or buy back stock.
$538000
-78.9%
-81.4%
FCF MarginThe ultimate cash conversion rate. It shows how good the company is at turning regular sales directly into cold, hard, spendable cash. A high percentage means the business is an absolute cash-printing machine.
+2.4%
-78.4%
-82.4%
Debt / EquityThe financial risk gauge. It compares how much of the company's empire was built using borrowed money (loans) versus the owners' own money (shareholders). A high number means they are heavily leveraged and playing a riskier game; a low number means they are playing it safe.
9.5%
-85.6%
-9.7%
Current RatioThe 12-month survival check. It simply compares the cash they have right now (plus things they can quickly turn into cash) against the immediate bills they absolutely must pay this year. A score above 1 means they have enough in the wallet to cover the upcoming bills without panicking.
0.88x
+12.9%
-6.8%
Total AssetsThe absolute size of the company's empire. It bundles together absolutely everything of value they own—from the cash in the register and the inventory in the warehouse, to the software patents in the vault and the factories on the ground.
Forrest MacConnell: Welcome to ACCESS Newswire's Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Forrest MacConnell, and I'm a Product Manager here at ACCESS Newswire on the IR product team. I've been with the company since 2021, initially joining what was then our onboarding team, which has since evolved into our customer experience team. Today, I lead our Investor Relations products and services across websites, newsrooms and shareholder engagement, supporting hundreds of our public company customers as well as emerging companies preparing to enter the public markets. Additionally, my team and I also manage the New York Stock Exchange subsidy whistleblower product in implementation for some of the world's largest and most recognizable brands. My time here at ACCESS has been incredibly rewarding, and I couldn't be more excited about what's ahead for our customers, for our company and for my team as we continue to grow and evolve our products and services. Before we begin, I would like to remind everyone that statements made in this conference call concerning future revenues, results from operations, financial position, markets, economic conditions, product releases, partnerships and any other statements that may be construed as predictions of future performance or events are forward-looking statements. These statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties as they may cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. We will also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures, which are provided for informational purposes and should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for GAAP results. With that, I'll turn the call over to our Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Brian Balbirnie; and our Chief Financial Officer, Steven Knerr.
Brian Balbirnie: Thank you, Forrest, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to discuss our second quarter 2026 results. Let me start with the headline number. Second quarter revenues were $5.6 million, up 5% sequentially from $5.3 million in the first quarter and essentially consistent with the second quarter of last year. Core press release revenue increased 2% year-over-year, which tells us that the underlying engine of this business remains healthy. That was offset, however, by lower revenues from our webcast business, where we saw fewer virtual annual meetings and less reseller activity. I want to spend a moment on where we made up real progress. Average ARR per subscription customer was $12,718 at the end of the quarter, up from $11,039 a year ago, a 15% increase and another quarter of ARR growth. This is the clearest evidence that our platform strategy, moving customers on to higher-value tiers continues to work. That progress is being driven by the products that we built and have brought to market over the last 90 days. Our Social Monitoring platform and our new Insights & Analytics Report are both live and early adoption …
