Fox Corp. Chief Executive Officer Lachlan Murdoch addressed the recent settlement of a defamation lawsuit on a call with investors Tuesday.
The media company controlled by the Murdoch family said sales rose 18% to $4.08 billion in revenue in the fiscal third quarter, ahead of Wall Street projections of $4.03 billion. Adjusted earnings rose to 94 cents per share, ahead of the consensus estimate for 87 cents.
Murdoch said Fox’s broadcast of the Super Bowl in February was a key driver of its advertising revenue growth of 43% in the quarter.
Shares were up 6% in premarket trading.
The parent of FS1 and the Fox broadcast network said the company posted a quarterly net loss of $50 million compared to net income of $290 million reported in the quarter the prior year, “primarily due to charges associated with legal settlement costs” at Fox News.
Fox agreed to pay a record $787.5 million to settle claims by Dominion Voting Systems Inc. that the company promoted false theories that the voting machine manufacturer rigged the 2020 presidential election.
Murdoch said that Fox “made the business decision” to resolve the lawsuit “to avoid the acrimony” of a trial and a multi-year appeal process.
Tucker Carlson, who had one of the most popular programs on cable TV, was fired last month after internal messages brought to light by the Dominion trial showed him bad-mouthing guests, colleagues and management.
Viewership of Fox News in prime time fell nearly 30% in the week after Carlson’s dismissal, according to Nielsen data.
Murdoch said he did not think Fox would see any significant financial impact from the writers strike, in part, because the company relies more on live sports and news while programming relatively few hours of general entertainment shows.
Murdoch added that the company was prepared to defend itself in a pending trial over a lawsuit from Smartmatic, another voting machine manufacturer, saying it was a “fundamentally different case” than the dispute with Dominion.
