Holiday movies drive quarterly revenue growth
"Wicked" amassed roughly $700 mln in global box office
Hurricanes, competition drive worse-than-expected broadband losses
Jan 30 (Reuters) - Comcast CMCSA.O surpassed fourth-quarter revenue estimates on Thursday as blockbuster holiday releases, including "Wicked", more than made up for a larger-than-expected decline in broadband customers.
The media and telecom giant also unveiled a $15 billion share buyback program.
"Wicked", a movie adaptation of the Broadway prequel to "The Wizard of Oz", earned roughly $700 million at the global box office, while the animated feature "The Wild Robot" grossed more than $300 million.
This helped power a near 7% rise in Comcast's studio revenue in the quarter and pushed its total revenue up 2.1% to $31.92 billion, beating estimates of $31.64 billion, according to LSEG data.
Its adjusted profit of 96 cents per share also topped estimates by 10 cents.
The results come at a crucial time for Comcast as it looks to unchain its main profit drivers such as studio and theme parks business from the declining cable TV unit by spinning off select NBCUniversal cable networks.
The company's broadband unit has also faced increasing competition in recent quarters from telecom firms such as AT&T and Verizon, who are trying to capture market share by bundling 5G wireless plans with high-speed fiber.
Comcast lost 139,000 broadband customers in the quarter, higher than FactSet estimates of a 91,000 loss, as it was also hurt by Hurricanes Milton and Helene that disrupted Florida businesses during the quarter.
Peacock's revenue rose 27.8% thanks to price hikes made last year ahead of the Olympics. The streaming service's subscriber count, however, stayed flat on-quarter at 36 million as Comcast sought to retain users after record additions in the third quarter.
Its cable TV networks lost 311,000 due to cord-cutting by consumers shifting to streaming. That was lower than 389,000 losses a year ago and FactSet estimates for loss of 333,000.
The theme park unit reported flat revenue at $2.37 billion. But its core earnings fell 3.9% due to pre-opening costs for Universal Epic Universe which is scheduled to open in May.
(Reporting by Harshita Mary Varghese in Bengaluru; Editing by Leroy Leo)
((HarshitaMary.Varghese@thomsonreuters.com))
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