Comcast Tops Revenue And Profit Estimates

Comcast's quarterly revenue topped Wall Street estimates on Thursday, as growth in its streaming and theme parks businesses, including a widely watched NFL playoff game, more than offset further losses of broadband subscribers, Reuters reports.

Revenue rose 2.3% to $31.25 billion in the fourth quarter, beating analysts' estimates of $30.51 billion, according to LSEG data.

Shares of the media giant rose more than 4% in trading before the bell.

Comcast lost 34,000 broadband customers in the quarter, less than the loss of 61,000 customers that had been forecast, according to FactSet but exceeding the 18,000 broadband customers it lost in the previous quarter.

Jason Armstrong

During the company's October call with investors, finance chief Jason Armstrong had said it expected "somewhat higher" broadband subscriber losses in the fourth quarter.

The company has faced pressure from wireless carriers such as Verizon and T-Mobile, which offer broadband services that target lower-income customers.

Revenue at the company's Peacock streaming service rose 56.5% from a year earlier, surpassing $1 billion in quarterly revenue for the first time to $1.03 billion. Paid subscribers increased by 3 million in the fourth quarter, to 31 million.

The company has been investing in live programming in an effort to draw more viewers to Peacock. This month, Peacock was the first streaming service to exclusively air an NFL playoff game. The Kansas City Chiefs and the Miami Dolphins game averaged 23 million viewers and became the most-streamed event in U.S. history.

Overall media revenue rose 3.1% to nearly $7 billion, but adjusted EBITDA fell 50% to $108 million due to increased sports programming costs and higher programming costs at Peacock. The increase in sports costs reflected higher media rights for NFL programming, the Premier League and the Big 10.

Domestic advertising revenue decreased 6.9% year over year to $2.64 billion, although sales would have increased 2.7% in the quarter with the exclusion of last year’s World Cup advertising.

Theatrical revenue rose 59% in the quarter based largely on the performance of four films: “Five Nights at Freddy’s,” “Trolls Band Together,” “The Exorcist: Believer” and “Migration.” Universal ranked first in global box office in 2023 for the first time since 2015 and produced three of the top five movies: “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” “Oppenheimer” and “Fast X.”