ABS-CBN Corporation, the country’s leading media and entertainment company, reported P9.6 billion consolidated revenue for the first three months of 2017.
ABS-CBN’s consumer sales grew by 10% to P4.7 billion while its first quarter airtime revenues were 13% lower compared to the same period last year.
ABS-CBN Chief Financial Officer Aldrin Cerrado said they did not expect a significant growth in earnings during the first quarter given the strong performance of the first quarter of last year.
He added, “First quarter earnings tend to be lower than the subsequent quarters due to the cyclicality of advertising placements.”
Meanwhile, Cerrado said they managed to reduce overall costs and expenses during the first quarter.
“We expect costs to go down further as we replace some of the higher cost programs which were carried over from last year,” he said.
“We remain confident that we will meet our earnings target of P3.0 billion for the year,” added Cerrado.
Based on Kantar Media TV Audience Measurement, ABS-CBN continues to dominate the national TV ratings with an overall audience share of 51.1% during the first quarter. ABS-CBN channels filled the Top 10 highest rating programs. The primetime lead in March 2017 was sustained by its top rating program and long running teleserye – “FPJ’s Ang Probinsyano.”
Star Cinema also generated close to P600 million from four movies released during the quarter. “My Ex and Whys,” which was released last February, brought in about P300 million in ticket sales.
As of end March 2017, total assets and equity stood at P71.6 billion and P31.0 billion, respectively.
Ron Valdueza, ABS-CBN’s Group CFO stated: “Sky saw an 11% growth in revenues to P2.3 billion driven by the continued increase in its broadband and DTH subscribers.” As of end March 2017, Sky had 672,000 cable subscribers, 161,000 DTH subscribers, and 205,000 broadband subscribers.
“The strong growth in our broadband subscriber base, which has doubled in two years, should continue as we invest in expanding our network,” added Valdueza.
Valdueza said he is happy with the progress of the DTT initiative as they ended the last quarter with 2.7 million boxes sold since the service was launched in 2015.
Kidzania, the company’s educational theme park, also welcomed over 77,000 visitors since the beginning of the year, while the O Shopping Channel generated P240 million in sales of various products for the first three months of 2017.
PhilRatings has also maintained the highest credit rating for ABS-CBN’s outstanding bonds. PhilRatings assigned a PRS Aaa Issue Credit Rating for the P6.0 billion outstanding ABS-CBN bonds with a Stable Outlook.
