Viacom: beats Wall Street consensus, market unimpressed

(CercleFinance.com) - Viacom's quarterly profit rose, beating estimates, in particular due to the success of the Paramount films "Bumblebee" and "What Men Want.
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Viacom - the company which owns Comedy Central, MTV and Paramount Pictures - said net profit for its second quarter ended 31 March rose to 383 million dollars, from 371 million dollars a year ago.

But total revenue for the quarter fell by 6% to 2.95 billion dollars, on the back of a 7% drop in advertising revenue for its networks.

The company said it grew its share of viewers at its flagship networks, while expanding distribution across traditional, digital and mobile platforms.

Viacom also noted that MTV was the fastest growing network in primetime amongst the top 30 broadcast and cable networks in the past quarter.

"Pet Sematary," the movie adapted from Stephen King's horror novel, performed well in theaters in the third quarter, the group added.

In the coming months, Paramount plans to release "Rocketman," a biopic about Elton John, and "Dora and the Lost City of Gold," a live action film based on Nickelodeon's Dora the Explorer franchise.

Viacom shares were down 0.2% at 28.4 dollars in early trading on Friday morning.

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