But its business lines outside TV, such as its ownership of the Bordeaux football club and a unit that markets DVDs, continued to drag on revenues and profits.

Chief Financial Officer Jerome Lefebure told Reuters in an interview that M6 was counting on the strong performances of new shows to continue to allow it to grow its share of France's TV advertising market.

"We see this year as being a bit difficult," he said, adding that it was hard to predict how consumer spending would hold up with a recession looming in France.

"We'll be helped by the fact that our audience numbers are holding up well ... we had an excellent month of January on our M6 channel," said Lefebure.

M6 posted earnings before interest and tax up 1.2 percent at 245 million euros, while revenue slipped 2.8 percent to 1.42 billion euros.

Analysts had been expecting revenue of 1.41 billion euros, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Ad revenue at its main M6 channel climbed 0.9 percent to 675.9 million euros.

M6 said that it would pay a dividend of 1 euro per share for 2011. (Reporting by Gwenaelle Barzic, writing by Leila Abboud, Editing by Caroline Jacobs)

• A Permanent Economic Emergency