Satellite TV company DirecTV added fewer subscribers in the US and Latin America in the fourth quarter as competition intensified.
The number of new customers in Latin America, the company’s largest growth area, fell about 65 percent from a year earlier to 231,000, while US net subscriber additions dropped almost 10 percent to 93,000.
Results in the US reflected “a more challenging competitive environment and mature industry,” DirecTV said.
Shares rose nearly 3 percent to close at $75.08.
In Latin America, subscriber numbers were hurt by a fall in imports of set-top boxes in Venezuela and by weak economic conditions and stronger competition in Argentina, Colombia and Chile, the company said.
DirecTV said it had 20.25 million subscribers in the US at the end of 2013, up about 0.8 percent from 2012.
On the company earnings call Thursday, DirecTV Chief Executive Mike White voiced his opposition to Comcast’s proposed takeover of Time Warner Cable, saying the deal would create “unprecedented media concentration in one company.”
White said the combined cable giant would have an “effective monopoly” in broadband services in up to two-thirds of the US and greater leverage over TV programmers that supply content.