• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, November 7, 2019

Dish Network added 214,000 Sling TV subscribers and lost 66,000 Dish TV subscribers in the third quarter, for a net gain of 148,000.

Pay-TV subscriber gains have become something of a rarity in recent times, including for Dish, which saw net subscriptions decline by 341,000 in Q3 2018.

Dish Network reported a total of 12.2 million pay-TV subscribers for this year’s third quarter, including 9.5 million for Dish TV and 2.7 million for Sling TV.

Diluted earnings per share were 66 cents, which was down from 82 cents in the year-ago quarter, but exceeded analysts’ expected 61 cents.

Revenue dipped slightly — down to $3.2 billion from the $3.4 billion in Q3 2018 — but again beat Wall Street’s projections. And subscriber expenses declined to $1.9 billion, from $2.1 billion in the year-ago quarter.

Year-to-date, shares are up by 17%, in part reflecting the satellite TV company’s strategic plan to offset the macro downtrend in pay-TV subscribers—and its inability to offer broadband services — by  building a competitive national wireless network, noted Deadline.

For the first nine months, Dish Network’s diluted EPS were $1.91, versus $2.35 for the same period in 2018. Revenue was $9.57 billion, down from $10.31 billion; and net income totaled $1.01 billion, down from $1.24 billion.