Why Lions Gate Entertainment's Shares Jumped More Than 13% Today
Mini-major movie and TV studio Lions Gate Entertainment (NYSE: LGF-A) (NYSE: LGF-B) roared on Friday, invigorated by a strong second-quarter earnings report. Class A shares rose as much as 13.7%, and the Class B stock topped out at a gain of 13.4%. By 1 p.m. EST, A shares had backed down to a 13% gain, while Lions Gate's B shares settled down at a 12% increase.
Lions Gate saw second-quarter sales rise 9.2% year over year, stopping at $984 million. Adjusted earnings held steady at $0.22 per diluted share. Your average analyst would have settled for a net loss of $0.05 per share on sales of roughly $912 million.
The premium cable network Starz added 1.2 million subscribers during the quarter, landing at a grand total of 5.6 million customers. The big revenue gains followed almost entirely from delivering a large batch of episodes of the award-winning TV series Power. The series runs on Starz and has been seen as an important growth driver for that network throughout its five-season history.
Source Fool.com
