EchoStar 3rd-Quarter Profit Tumbles
Tuesday November 7
EchoStar Communications 3Q Profit Tumbles Due to Tax Benefit in Year-Ago Period
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) -- Satellite television operator EchoStar Communications Corp., which operates the DISH network, said Tuesday its third-quarter profit tumbled 33 percent compared with the year-ago period, which was boosted by a tax benefit.
Net income fell to $140 million, or 31 cents per share, from $209 million, or 46 cents per share, a year earlier.
Last year's results were aided by a tax benefit of $73 million.
Quarterly revenue rose 16 percent to $2.47 billion from $2.13 billion.
Analysts polled by Thomson Financial were looking for earnings of 38 cents per share on sales of $2.44 billion.
The company said it added 295,000 new subscribers, ending the quarter with about 12.8 million subscribers.
For the first nine months, EchoStar reported net income of $455.7 million, or $1.02 per share, compared with $1.4 billion, or $2.92 per share, in the same period a year ago.
Year-to-date revenue was $7.2 billion, compared with $6.2 billion a year earlier.
EchoStar shares rose 67 cents, or 1.9 percent, to close at $35.98 on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
In its earnings filing, EchoStar said future results could be affected by court battles over distant programming and a TiVo patent.
Last month, a federal judge in Florida ordered EchoStar to stop offering customers network programming from providers that are distant from them. EchoStar said Tuesday it would have to cut off distant network channels to about 900,000 subscribers unless it can reverse the ruling through the courts, legislation or other means.
In August, a federal judge in Texas ordered EchoStar to pay TiVo $89.6 million in a lawsuit alleging EchoStar and certain subsidiaries violated TiVo's patent for storing and playing back television programming.
EchoStar has appealed.
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