By Adwitiya Srivastava

(Reuters) - Australian broadcaster Nine Entertainment ( NNMTF ) said on Thursday Chief Executive Officer Mike Sneesby would step down with effect from Sept. 30 and that chief finance and strategy officer Matt Stanton would take over on an interim basis.

Shares of the company fell as much as 4.4% to their lowest level since April 27, 2020 and were among the top losers on the benchmark stock index, which was up 0.6% as of 1237 GMT.

Stanton, who was appointed as Nine's chief finance and strategy officer in August 2023, will take up the acting CEO role from Oct. 1.

Before joining Nine, he had also held the position of chief transformation officer at Woolworths, one of Australia's top grocers, among other roles.

"The group needs to embark on a cost out to maintain profit in FY25 - additional CEO responsibilities might distract him from executing on the cost-out front," said Darren Leung, a senior research analyst at Macquarie Securities (Australia).

In its recent annual results, Nine reported a 22% fall in net profit after tax and a 3% decline in revenue.

Sneesby was appointed as the chief executive of Nine in April 2021, and since then the company's share price had fallen more than 55% as of Wednesday's close.

The CEO change comes a few months after chairman Peter Costello resigned and non-executive deputy chair Catherine West took over.

The company said it would undertake a recruitment process to identify a new CEO.

(Reporting by Adwitiya Srivastava in Bengaluru; Editing by Mohammed Safi Shamsi and Subhranshu Sahu)