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Comcast (CMCSA) Q2 Earnings Beat Estimates, Revenues Miss

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Comcast (CMCSA - Free Report) reported second-quarter 2019 adjusted earnings of 78 cents per share that beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 3 cents. The figure increased 13% year over year.

Consolidated revenues increased 23.6% year over year to $26.89 billion but lagged the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $27.19 billion.

However, revenues on a Pro-Forma basis (considering the Sky transaction on Jan 1, 2017) increased 0.8% year over year.

Cable Communication Revenue Details

Revenues climbed 3.9% from the year-ago quarter to $14.45 billion. Total Customer Relationships increased 152K to 30.9 million.

High-speed Internet revenues grew 9.4% year over year to $4.66 billion, primarily driven by increased residential high-speed Internet customers and rate adjustments. Total high-speed Internet customer net additions were 209K.

Business Services revenues increased 9.8% to $1.93 billion, driven by customer base expansion.

Comcast Corporation Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Comcast Corporation Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise

Comcast Corporation price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | Comcast Corporation Quote

 

Wireless revenues grew 21% to $244 million, supported by an increase in the number of customer lines. Comcast added 181K wireless lines in the reported quarter.

Other revenues increased 6% from the year-ago quarter to $427 million, primarily due to higher sales from security and automation services. Total security and automation customer net additions were 23K at the end of the second quarter.

Advertising revenues declined 8.7% to $607 million, primarily due to lower political advertising revenues.

Voice revenues were $982 million, down 1.1% year over year, owing to a declining number of residential voice customers.

Video revenues dropped 0.6% to $5.59 billion, reflecting a decline in the number of residential video customer count.

Total video customer net losses were 224K, while total voice customer net losses were 65K.

At the end of the second quarter, 66.6% of Comcast’s residential customers received at least two Xfinity products.

NBCUniversal Revenues Down Y/Y

Revenues declined 0.8% year over year to almost $8.21 billion.

Cable Networks’ revenues increased 2.5% from the year-ago quarter to $2.95 billion, primarily due to higher distribution (up 3.4%) and content licensing & other revenues (up 5.1%). Advertising revenues were flat year over year.

Broadcast Television revenues inched up 0.5% from the year-ago quarter to $2.40 billion, driven by increased distribution & other revenues (up 14.7%), partially offset by lower advertising (down 4.2%) and content licensing revenues (down 1.7%).

Filmed Entertainment revenues decreased 14.8% from the year-ago quarter to $1.46 billion. Theatrical revenues plunged 53.1% due to a lesser number of major releases than the year-ago quarter. Content licensing revenues increased 9.8% year over year.

Theme Parks revenues were $1.46 billion, up 7.5% year over year, driven by higher attendance owing to favorable timing of the spring holidays and increased guest spending.

Sky Revenue Details

Pro-Forma Revenues declined 3.3% year over year to $4.83 billion. At constant currency (cc), revenues increased 2.4%.

Direct-to-consumer revenues declined 4% (up 1.7% at cc) from the year-ago quarter to $3.89 billion.

Content revenues increased 21% (27.7% at cc) to $376 million, benefiting from exclusive sports rights recently acquired by the company in Italy and Germany, and higher monetization of the its slate of original programming.

Advertising revenues deteriorated 10.7% (down 5.6% at cc) from the year-ago quarter to $563 million.

Pro-Forma Total Customer Relationships increased 304K to 24 million in the reported quarter.

Operating Details

Consolidated programming & production costs increased 31% from the year-ago quarter to $8.26 billion. As percentage of revenues, programming & production costs expanded 180 basis points (bps) on a year-over-year basis.

Consolidated adjusted EBITDA increased 17.5% from the year-ago quarter to $8.72 billion. Pro-Forma (including Sky operations) adjusted EBITDA increased 7.6%.

Segment-wise, Cable Communications’ adjusted EBITDA increased 7.4% from the year-ago quarter to $5.85 billion. Cable Communications operating expenses increased 1.6% on a year-over-year basis on higher programming and non-programming costs.

Cable Communications results include a loss of $88 million from the wireless business compared with a loss of $185 million in the year-ago quarter.

NBCUniversal adjusted EBITDA increased 8.1% from the year-ago quarter to $2.32 billion, reflecting growth at Broadcast Television, Filmed Entertainment, Cable Networks and Theme Parks adjusted EBITDA.

Sky’s adjusted EBITDA on a pro-forma basis increased 13.4% (up 19.9% at cc) to $772 million. Notably, Sky’s operating costs and expenses fell 5.9% (down 0.4% at cc) to $4.06 billion.

Consolidated operating income increased 6.8% year over year to $5.36 billion. However, operating margin contracted 310 bps from the year-ago quarter to 19.9%.

Cash Flow & Liquidity

In second-quarter 2019, Comcast generated $7 billion of cash from operations compared with $7.23 billion in the previous quarter.

Capital expenditures increased 0.6% to $2.3 billion. NBCUniversal’s capital expenditures rose 2.7% to $473 million. Sky reported capital expenditures of $177 million.

Free cash flow was $4.20 billion in the reported quarter.

During the quarter, Comcast paid out dividends worth $954 million.

Zacks Rank & Stocks to Consider

Currently, Comcast carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Electronic Arts (EA - Free Report) , Liberty Global (LBTYA - Free Report) and AMC Entertainment (AMC - Free Report) are stocks worth considering in the broader Consumer & Discretionary sector. All three stocks carry a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 (Strong Buy) Rank stocks here.

While EA is set to report on Jul 30, Liberty Global and AMC are scheduled to report on Jul 7 and 8, respectively.

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