It doesn’t seem to matter much as Lions Gate refuses to rest on its Panem laurels. In between its Twilight and Hunger Games releases, its horror franchises (Saw, Warm Bodies, Sinister, The Possession) shoring up profits. The TV division owns Weeds, Mad Men, Nurse Jackie, Anger Management, and Tyler Perry’s opus of work. It is still building on its youth franchise with Divergent, another teen dystopian trilogy, among many more book-related young adult movies to come. The Tyler Perry franchise also extends to film.
The company also owns an extensive (over 15,000 titles) video library and is beginning to develop its own music studio. That video library helped the company beat expectations when it reported last week, fueled by DVD sales of Twilight, Hunger Games, and fitness videos.
Lions Gate isn’t considered a value name like competitor Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCSA), with a yield of 1.90% and a 17 trailing P/E. Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCSA)’s cable empire is able to absorb any Universal Studios entertainment misses although there haven’t been many this year with “Identity Thief” doing well and “Fast and Furious 6” (has it been 6 already?!) paying for itself after two weekends, still number one at the box office. The film has brought in over $171 million so far with a budget of $160 million.
If Lions Gate had a yield, it would compare very favorably to Comcast. Considering Comcast has a market cap of $106 billion and Sony’s is $19.6 billion, little Lions Gate at $3.98 billion is growing just fine.
In all the noise over Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) and original content for streaming with Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) also getting in the game, it has been forgotten that Lions Gate is providing some of that new content for streaming for Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), Hulu, and Netflix with “Orange is the New Black” for Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) as a notable example.
Feasting on Panem
Panem, the setting for Hunger Games based on the Latin for bread, has a third installment, Mockingjay, coming out in 2014. There are still more champagne corks to be popped at Lions Gate with original content for Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu plus the video library and TV franchises. And Twilight, more horror films, and the TV franchises will keep the party going. Maybe it’s even time to break out the caviar if the new dystopia and young adult sagas catch fire, too.
Meanwhile, at Sony’s entertainment division, the dollar store sodas and chips are going flat and getting stale. At Comcast, the party may be more sedate than the giddy Lions Gate gala, but a party nonetheless. Welcome to the party, Mr. Cramer!
AnnaLisa Kraft has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned.
The article Too Late for This Blockbuster Party. Really?! originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by AnnaLisa Kraft.
AnnaLisa is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network — entries represent the personal opinion of the blogger and are not formally edited.
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