AMC Entertainment Holdings Inc. reported third-quarter results on Wednesday that beat expectations both above and below the line, as the movie theater chain and darling of the meme stocks posted gains.
The company posted net income of $12.3 million, or 8 cents per share, compared with a loss of $226.9 million, or $2.20 per share, in the year-ago quarter. Excluding one-off items, AMC AMC,
reported a loss of 9 cents per share. Analysts polled by FactSet expected a loss of 25 cents per share.
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Revenue grew 45.2% to $1.406 billion, above the FactSet consensus of $1.260 billion. AMC’s adjusted Ebitda was $194 million.
“For both revenue and adjusted Ebitda, these were AMC’s most successful third-quarter results in our company’s entire 103-year history, necessarily greater than the pre-pandemic third quarter of 2019,” AMC CEO Adam Aron said in a statement . . “For the second consecutive quarter, AMC reported positive net income and we ended the quarter with $730 million in cash. All of this indicates that we are well underway on our growth path to recovery from the ravages of the COVID pandemic.”
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“Perhaps most impressive of all, our success in the third quarter came at a time when our domestic box office attendance for the quarter was still 16% below comparable 2019 levels,” Aron added . “That success is due to the fact that our contribution per patron was 30% higher than in 2019.”
Admission revenue was $797.7 million, above the FactSet consensus of $739 million. Food and beverage sales were $482.7 million, above the FactSet consensus of $449 million.
Shares of AMC fell 1.3% in extended trading on Wednesday. The company’s shares are down 71.9% in 2023, compared to the S&P 500 index’s SPX gain of 14.2%.
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During a conference call to discuss the results, Aron said the short-term impact of the writers and actors strikes will create challenges for AMC in 2024. “Without taking sides… we strongly encourage all parties involved to come to the negotiating table with the intention of to reach an agreement immediately,” he said.
The AMC CEO also discussed the success of Taylor Swift’s record-breaking concert film, which premiered on October 12. “Both as a distributor and as an exhibitor, AMC has benefited significantly,” he said, adding that AMC Theaters Distribution is following this success with the release of ‘Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé’, set to hit theaters worldwide on December 1 .
“Working with two of the most admired pop stars in the world, we have already achieved lightning,” Aron added. “However, we are optimistic that this will lead to much more in the future… we believe we will have several more concert film products in 2024 and 2025. We plan to collaborate with some of the most well-known and best-loved music artists the world has ever known.”