Cable companies not seeing decline just yet
All you hear about these days is people “cutting the cable cord” and using on-demand video services to replace their old cable subscriptions. How often is it actually happening, though? If stock values of major cable companies are any indication, perhaps not that often at all.
Comcast (CMCSA) is the nation’s biggest cable provider, so their results are certainly valuable as a barometer of how well cable companies are doing as a whole. How is Comcast doing? Not just well, but historically well.
That’s right- Comcast hit an all-time high this week, with their shares being up almost 30% in the current calendar year. The company hasn’t released their third quarter reports yet (that will happen on Wednesday), but analysts are expecting an increase of almost 33% in earnings per share from one year ago.
Should you mention that Comcast is not merely a cable company but also an owner of content, too, what about Time Warner Cable (TWC)? They’re up almost 20% this year. What about satellite? DirecTV (DTV) and Dish Network (DISH) are each up more than 25% this year.
The funny thing is that on-demand content providers like Netflix (NFLX) are doing well, too. That seems to indicate that perhaps cable television and on-demand video are not quite the either/or proposition that many make them out to be. It seems that many people are enjoying both, actually.
Considering that many cable companies offer high-speed internet as well as cable television services, the two may not go together so poorly, after all. Many times, customers can save a little money by bundling their internet and cable packages, too.
Furthermore, the better on-demand video companies have diversified themselves from cable by offering original series and functionality on every modern device known to man. You can now watch highly-regarded Netflix original series like “Orange is the New Black” from just about every device in your home besides your toaster (and that’s probably on the way).
For now, it appears that cable companies can coexist with the likes of Netflix. We’ll see how long that lasts, though.
