NEW YORK, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- U.S. telecom conglomerate Comcast reported its earnings results for the fourth quarter (Q4) and full year of 2018, beating Wall Street estimates and driving its shares up nearly 5.5 percent around the closing bell on Wednesday.
The Philadelphia-based company recorded quarterly earnings per share of 0.64 U.S. dollar and Q4 revenue of 27.846 billion U.S. dollars, topping expectations of analysts who were surveyed by U.S. financial markets data provider Refinitiv.
Continued strength has shown in its NBCUniversal Media unit and cable business during Q4, the company said in the latest quarterly earnings report on Wednesday.
Owned by Comcast, NBCUniversal Media is a New York City-based global mass media company and the parent company of CNBC and NBC.
NBCUniversal posted Q4 revenue of 9.4 billion U.S. dollars, up 7.1 percent compared with the same quarter last year.
Its four main services all saw revenue growth, involving cable networks, broadcast television, filmed entertainment studios and theme parks.
Strength also showed in the cable unit with quarterly revenue of 14.1 billion U.S. dollars, up 5.2 percent year on year.
Among the cable operations, the high-speed internet (HSI) customers increased 351,000 during Q4 and pulled HSI business revenue up by 10 percent.
However, Comcast lost traditional pay-TV subscribers to 29,000, down from the 33,000 last year.
For its annual performance, Comcast's revenue rose 5.2 percent year on year to 28.3 billion U.S. dollars, driven by its acquisition of British broadcaster Sky.
With the strong performance of 2018, Brian Roberts, chairman and CEO of Comcast, announced a 10-percent increase in the company's dividend in 2019, marking its 11th consecutive annual increase.
"We truly became a global company with our acquisition of Sky, and are excited about its future and the potential of our combined company in 2019 and beyond," the CEO said.
