Comcast exceeded third-quarter earnings expectations on Thursday, driven by the Summer Olympics in Paris which boosted NBCUniversal’s revenue and Peacock’s subscriber count. Comcast’s shares rose by 6% in early trading on Thursday. The company’s net income for the quarter ended Sept. 30 decreased by 10% to $3.63 billion, with adjusted earnings per share of $1.12. Adjusted EBITDA fell by 2% to around $9.74 billion.
Revenue for Comcast increased by 6.5% to $32.07 billion compared to the same period last year. The media segment, primarily NBCUniversal, saw revenue rise by nearly 37% to $8.23 billion, largely due to the Olympics. The company is considering separating its cable networks business. The Summer Olympics in Paris attracted an average daily viewership of 31 million people and generated a record $1.2 billion in advertising revenue.
The content and experiences segment, which includes theme parks and film studios, saw revenue increase by 19.3% to approximately $12.6 billion, with Peacock gaining 3 million subscribers during the Olympics. The film studios revenue increased by 12.3% to $2.83 billion, while theme parks revenue decreased by 5.3% to about $2.3 billion due to lower attendance.
Comcast’s broadband unit continued to reflect industry trends, with cable broadband customer growth slowing down. The company experienced total domestic broadband net losses of 87,000, but estimated growth of 9,000 customers excluding losses from the end of the Affordable Connectivity Program. Domestic broadband revenue increased by 2.7% to $6.54 billion, with average revenue per user rising by 3.6%.
Comcast’s wireless business added 319,000 customers, reaching a total of about 7.5 million lines, while losing 365,000 cable TV customers during the quarter. The company’s performance was discussed during a call on Thursday, with the CFO noting that the broadband business typically benefits from back-to-school activity in the third quarter.
