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    Comcast profit slides as pandemic hits movies, theme parks

    By SHOOTUpdated:No Comments1608 Views
    In this Oct. 1, 2019, file photo the symbol for Comcast appears on a screen at the Nasdaq MarketSite, in New York. Comcast’s net income slid in the first three months of 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic forced it to shut down its theme parks and its movies were kept out of shuttered theaters. On the cable side, the biggest source of the company’s profits, Comcast lost 409,000 video customers, as cord-cutting accelerated, and added 477,000 internet customers. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

    By Tali Arbel, AP Technology Writer

    --

    Comcast's net income slid in the first three months of the year as the coronavirus pandemic forced it to shut down its theme parks and its movies were kept out of shuttered theaters.

    Comcast also reported Thursday that it lost 409,000 cable TV customers, the biggest source of the company's profits, as cord-cutting accelerated. That's already more than half the 671,000 customers it lost in all of 2019. 

    But it added 477,000 internet customers, which it said was its best quarterly number in more than a decade. It came as U.S. workplace shutdowns began in March and a mass work-from-home  migration underscored the role home internet plays in Americans' lives. 

    Americans are increasingly opting for cheaper streaming video providers that are delivered over the internet, like Netflix, which both benefits and harms Comcast's business as an internet and traditional TV provider. 

    Competition in online video is also increasing with new entrants like Disney  and Apple. Comcast's own streaming service, Peacock, will launch nationwide in July, with free and paid versions.

    In the Philadelphia company's NBCUniversal arm, revenue slid 7% and a key profit measure plunged by 25% as the Universal Studios parks closed and closed movie theaters hurt box office. It is experimenting with alternatives, releasing "Trolls World Tour" digitally in April, the current quarter. Comcast said it  was a success. 

    Analysts expect ad revenues on NBC and the company's cable channels to decline this year, especially as the Olympics, a big ratings draw, have been postponed until 2021. Ad revenue in the first quarter dipped 2.2% for cable channels and was nearly unchanged for the broadcast channels, NBC and Telemundo. But the outbreak's impact only started being felt in the U.S. at the end of the January-March period.

    Comcast's European TV and broadband arm, Sky, also lost money as the virus impacted Europe earlier than in the U.S. Its revenue fell 3.7% when not counting currency conversions, and a key profit measure dropped 15.3%.

    Overall, Comcast net income dropped 40% to $2.15 billion, or 46 cents per share. Adjusted to exclude write-downs of the value of some assets, earnings dropped 6.6% to 71 cents per share, beating Wall Street's estimate of 69 cents, according to FactSet.

    Revenue fell nearly 1% to $26.61 billion, just shy of analysts' estimate of $26.87 billion.

    In morning trading, shares slid more than 5% to $36.96.

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    Tags:ComcastNBCUniversal



    Ben Jones, “Dukes of Hazzard” actor and 2-term U.S. House member, dies at 84

    Monday, August 10, 2026
    Cooter, actor Ben Jones, sits atop one of the 229 hotrods, named the General Lee, used in the show "Dukes of Hazzard" as ecstatic fan, Aliceson Johnson, of Charlottesville, Va., sits in the drivers seat in front of his store in Sperryville, Va., Tuesday, Aug. 10, 1999. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)

    Ben Jones, who played the good ol' boy mechanic in "The Dukes of Hazzard" TV series and parlayed his fame into a political career and two terms in the U.S. House, has died. He was 84.

    Jones had a heart attack in his home Sunday in Washington, Virginia, as he was waiting to watch his beloved Atlanta Braves play baseball, his wife, Alma Viator, said on social media. Rappahannock County Sheriff Connie Compton confirmed his death.

    Jones' fame came from his role as Cooter Davenport, the mechanic who got the Duke boys out of jams as they tried to do the right thing and fight the corrupt Boss Hogg in the fictional Hazzard County, Georgia.

    After playing Cooter for all seven seasons of the series from 1979 to 1985, Jones turned to politics and was elected to the U.S. House from a district near Atlanta in 1988. The Democrat served two terms before he was redistricted out of the seat.

    Jones was born in North Carolina and in college got involved in acting and civil rights, he wrote in his autobiography "Redneck Boy in the Promised Land: The Confessions of 'Crazy Cooter.'"

    Acting took over his life. Jones performed in numerous stage productions and had a few minor TV and movie roles in Atlanta during the 1970s before his life-defining break came on a TV show Jones defended as a modern-day morality tale and a fine example of Southern values.

    For seven seasons, Jones was one of a small band of friends and family helping Bo and Luke Duke in "The Dukes of Hazzard." The cousins were on probation for running moonshine and were constantly trying to clear their names and stop the crooked and powerful Boss Hogg from stealing or cheating.

    The Duke boys drove a modified 1969 Dodge Charger called the General Lee with a Confederate flag on... Read More

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