DirecTV, majority owned by News Corp., beat estimates with 1Q06 net income of $235 million, or 17 cents a share, compared to a loss of $41 million, or 3 cents a share, in the same quarter last year. The Reuters Estimates number was $155.8 million, or 10 cents a share. The most important factor: a 13-plus percent increase in high quality subs during the quarter, which also led to lower churn for the first time in nearly two years. That countered a 19 percent drop in gross additions.
Not all analysts were pleased: Ladenburg Thalmann analyst William Kidd told clients it wasn’t “as positive as it seems. … Since DirecTV builds value through adding subscribers, our bias is always to subscriber growth over earnings.”
Earnings release | Webcast (replay)
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