Earnings: Cablevision Posts Q4 Loss On Newsday Writedown
This story was written by David Kaplan.
Charges related to its purchase of Long Island daily paper Newsday and the shuttering of its Voom HD service helped push Cablevision (NYSE: CVC) to a $321.4 million ( $1.11 per share) net loss in Q4. That compares to profits of $6.64 million ($0.02 cents per share) the year before. And despite the bad economy effecting most companies' revenues, the recession could be helping boost its services as consumers stay home and watch cable TV, as Cablevision revs were up 11.4 percent to $2.05 billion. The company just missed hitting consensus estimates from FactSet analysts, which anticipated Cablevision's Q4 revenues to come in $2.06 billion, according to Marketwatch. Furthermore, the company did report that basic video subs were down 3,800 or 0.1 percent.
Impairment charges were $402.4 million at NewsdayCablevision acquired a 97 percent stake from The Tribune Company for about $650 million back in May and $41 million at VOOM HD. The charges related to VOOM were slightly higher than previously expected.
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By David Kaplan