Liberty Global’s Horizon TV ended the second quarter with 645,000 subscribers in the four countries it was present in.
With Virgin Media also claiming 2.3 million TiVo subscribers, over one in three (36%) of Liberty’s total digital cable base in the five markets received an advanced video service.
The Netherlands, Switzerland and Ireland gained a combined 65,000 Horizon customers in Q2, taking the total for the three countries to over 510,000.
The Netherlands had the lion’s share (245,000), followed by Switzerland (180,000) and Ireland (85,000).
Liberty’s video losses in Q2 were the lowest in a second quarter since 2006, with Germany reporting its best-ever figures.
This was partly driven by Horizon/TiVo, which gained a combined total of 240,000 customers in Q2.
Broadband results were the best recorded in a Q2 (+185,000), with strong performances in the UK, Netherlands and Poland.
Meanwhile, in CEE Liberty saw a sharp fall in its DTH subscriber total in Romania, losing 22,000 customers in the second quarter. It also lost 500 in Slovakia, with the other two markets in which it provides DTH services – Hungary and the Czech Republic – showing only modest gains of 2,400 and 1,400 respectively.
Liberty’s revenues in Q2 amounted to $4,602.2 million ($3,057.8 million a year earlier), while the corresponding figures for H1 were $9,135.9 million and $5,729.7 million respectively.
The net loss attributable to shareholders in Q2 was $249.9 million ($11.6 million a year earlier) and $328.7 million ($12.6 million) in H1.
Commenting on the results, CEO Mike Fries said: “Our business is thriving on all fronts – operationally, strategically and financially. We added nearly 240,000 new RGUs in the second quarter, a 25%
improvement over last year, fueled again by our superior broadband speeds and advanced TV services like Horizon and TiVo. This volume growth, along with price increases and improving momentum in B2B
and mobile, drove rebased revenue growth above 3% in the second quarter. In addition, we are heavily focused on using our operating leverage and scale to drive efficiencies across our footprint and these
initiatives helped us achieve 7% rebased OCF growth year-to-date and 40% Adjusted Free Cash Flow growth1. Not surprisingly, we remain confident that we’ll achieve or exceed all our public guidance targets for the full year.
Fries added: “Strategically, we’re making steady progress on the Ziggo transaction, which we remain confident will close in the second half of 2014. We are also executing on our content strategy, with plans to invest in All3Media, a U.K.-based global production company, and De Vijver Media, a leading commercial broadcaster in Belgium, and with the recently completed acquisition of an interest in ITV, the largest commercial broadcaster in the U.K. These financially attractive investments require limited equity capital and will allow us to participate or partner with great content businesses that should bolster our core cable operations over the long-term. And lastly, we continue our focus on returning capital through share buybacks, with approximately $900 million in repurchases during the first half of 2014, and we’re targeting an additional $2.6 billion by year-end 2015”.
