ONE HUNDRED BILLION DOLLARS
Posted on 01/29/2003 1:56:40 PM PST by GeneD
NEW YORK (Reuters) - AOL Time Warner Inc., the world's largest media company, on Wednesday posted a loss for all of 2002 of nearly $100 billion, the largest annual loss in U.S. history, after taking a $45.5 billion charge in the fourth quarter to write down the value of assets.
AOL reported a fourth quarter net loss of $44.9 billion, or $10.04 a share, after taking the non-cash charge to write down the value of its embattled America Online business and other assets, compared to a year-ago loss of $1.8 billion, or 41 cents a share.
The company, which in the first quarter had reported a net loss of $54 billion after writing down the value of assets, posted a full-year 2002 net loss of $98.7 billion.
The full-year loss exceeded the gross domestic product of Egypt in 2001.
Strength in the company's film/entertainment business, with hits like the "Lord of the Rings" sequel, and cable networks offset weakness in the fourth quarter at America Online, which has been suffering from a sharp slowdown in advertising spending and subscriber growth.
The quarter capped a tumultuous year. About two years after AOL completed its $106.2 billion purchase of Time Warner, the old media veterans from Time Warner are running the show and the key architects of the deal have been forced out amid calls from angry investors that view the merger as a failure.
AOL Time Warner said its revenue in the quarter grew 8 percent to $11.4 billion.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) -- a key measure of cash flow --- rose 16 percent to $2.8 billion from a year-earlier for the quarter.
Analysts polled by Multex expected, on average, EBITDA of $2.6 billion.
The company said it sees revenue growth for the 2003 full year in the mid-single digits and said it sees EDITDA to be essentially unchanged to down in the low-single digits.
Earlier on Wednesday, AOL Time Warner said it sold its 8.4 percent stake in Hughes Electronics Corp. as part of its efforts to cut its debt load.
The company said it plans to reduce total consolidated debt to approximately $20 billion by the end of 2004.
Shares of AOL closed up 30 cents, or 2.2 percent, at $13.96 on the New York Stock Exchange ahead of the results.
... posted a loss for all of 2002 of nearly $100 billion
Does this mean that Time Warner can buy itself out again??
That is a lot of "friggin" money
Let Arthur Blank pony up the money.
I like to think that I helped do my part to sink this sorry company.
The bear market will continue until they change their stubborn and ignorant minds.
And the stock increased in value
I can imagine they're losing revenue there -- but tens of billions of dollars? That doesn't seem realistic.
Sounds to me like they're going to kill that part of the business.
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