DreamWorks Animation Swings to Quarterly, Annual Loss

DreamWorks Animation unveiled some red ink in its Q4 and fiscal 2012 results. For the quarter, the company posted revenue of $265 million, a 21% year-over-year improvement on Q4 2011's $219 million. The bottom line, however, plunged into negative territory with a loss of $83 million ($0.98 per diluted share), compared with a $24 million ($0.29) profit in the same period the previous year.

Although that revenue figure beat the average analyst expectation of $213 million, EPS missed by a long shot. The market had been anticipating a much narrower loss of $0.03 per share.

For the full year, revenue was just under $750 million, or 62% better than in 2011. The net loss was $36 million ($0.43 per diluted share), against a profit of $87 million ($1.02) the year before.

DreamWorks Animation attributed the bottom-line shortfalls to a series of expensive writeoffs for several of its titles, including a $165 million charge for the underperforming Rise of the Guardians, and a $54 million hit to delay a planned 2014 release, Me & My Shadow.

The article DreamWorks Animation Swings to Quarterly, Annual Loss originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributor Eric Volkman has no position in DreamWorks Animation. The Motley Fool recommends DreamWorks Animation. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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