Telecommunications tycoon Rupert Murdoch smiles. His 21st Century Fox reported a fiscal fourth-quarter profit of $999 million, improving on the same period last year, when the company posted losses of $371 million. He beat all analysts' expectations in relation to the value of the shares, which reached 42 cents, against the 38 expected.
The positive result is primarily linked to the performance of the cable channel divisions. Fox's revenue surged to $3,35 billion, boosting its prior earnings by $2,95 billion, while operating profits rose 11%, from $1,08 billion to $1,2 billion. In addition, film production increased revenues by 0,76 billion, almost tripling operating profits, which rose from 117 million to 339 million.
More gloomy results in Italy, where the subsidiary Sky reports a loss of 25 subscribers together with an increase in costs, limited however to the transmission of the soccer world cup in sip June. Furthermore, Sky Italia is about to be sold to the British BSkyB together with the German Sky Deutschland a $9,3 billion deal. Another slight loss for the Australian tycoon came from the free-to-air television networks, where a drop in advertising investments was discounted, due to a drop in turnover to 1,03, from the 1,1 billion dollars in the previous period.
