Lionsgate reported revenue for its fiscal fourth quarter on Thursday that fell shy of Wall Street expectations, as the film business experienced a 20% decline in revenue in 2018.
The film and TV company reported a net loss of $159 million, or a loss of 72 cents per share, after reporting earnings of 41 cents per-share during the same period a year ago. Wall Street analysts tracked by Yahoo Finance had forecast Lionsgate would report a loss of 6 cents per-share. The company said that when adjusted, however, it was per-share earnings of 11 cents.
Revenue for the quarter was $914 million, a decline compared with the same period a year ago, during which Lionsgate generated revenue of $1.04 billion. Analysts expected revenue to hit $949.44 million in the quarter.
“We’ve completed a very active and productive fiscal 2019 in which we set in place all the elements for strong growth and continued value creation in the year ahead,” said Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer in a statement. “We’ve refilled our film and television content pipelines, refocused on extracting maximum value from our franchise properties and are capitalizing on an extraordinary opportunity to continue Starz’s global expansion and cement its stature as one of the leading international pure play subscription video-on-demand services.”
The studio, which has undergone some restructuring as the company attempts to revitalize the business, reported revenue of $357.6 million, down from $424.9 million during the same period a year ago. Lionsgate also said that film revenue for the full fiscal year dropped 20% to $1.46 billion due to a smaller film slate compared with the prior year.
In the three months ending March 31, Lionsgate released six films: “Perfect Strangers,” “Cold Pursuit,” “Tyler Perry’s A Madea Family Funeral,” “The Kid,” “No Manches Frida 2” and “Five Feet Apart.”
TV production revenue declined slightly to $272.8 million, compared with the $294.7 million Lionsgate reported in the year-earlier period. Revenue at Lionsgate’s media networks increased, however, to $362.0 million, compared with $353.4 in the prior year.