Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. posted strong earnings for the quarter ended Sept. 30 that beat analysts’ expectations, driven by television operations.
The Santa Monica studio reported net income of $20.8 million (15 cents a share) for the quarter, compared with $500,000 in the same quarter a year earlier. Revenue rose 11 percent to $553 million.
The results beat expectations. Analysts believed earnings would be 8 cents a share on revenue of $522 million.
Bolstered by the pay television window opening for “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire” and the free television window opening for “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn,” television revenue included in the motion picture segment more than doubled to $69.4 million, compared to $34.6 million in the same quarter a year earlier.
Share of Lions Gate rose 4 cents on Thursday to close $32.06. Earnings were posted after markets closed.
Walt Disney Co. beat analysts’ profit estimates by a penny in its most recent quarter, helped along by a strong box office showing from “Guardians of the Galaxy.”
The Burbank entertainment and media company reported net income of $1.5 billion (86 cents a share) for the quarter ended Sept. 27, compared to $1.4 billion (77 cents) in the same period a year earlier. Revenue increased 7 percent to $12.4 billion.
Excluding a $73 million impairment charge related to its FCC radio licenses, adjusted earnings per share was 89 cents.
Analysts on average expected net income of 88 cents on revenue of $12.4 billion, according to Thomson Financial Network.
The studio entertainment division had the highest revenue increase of the five Disney business units.
Revenue from feature films and home entertainment releases was $1.8 billion, an increase of 18 percent from the fourth quarter a year ago. The big contributors were box office from August release “Guardians of the Galaxy,” which earned $765 million worldwide, as well as sales from the home entertainment release of “Frozen.”
The interactive division was the only business unit to show a decrease in revenue, dropping 9 percent to $362 million. The decrease was attributed to the timing of the release of “Disney Infinity 2.0” a week before the quarter ended.
Shares closed up $1, or just more than 1 percent, to $92 on the New York Stock Exchange. Earnings were posted after market close.
