• by Wayne Friedman , May 1, 2020

As Charter Communications narrowed its video subscriber losses by half in the first quarter of 2020 versus the same time period a year ago, its overall broadband business continued to climb -- both in subscribers and revenue.

Mid-day Friday trading of Charter stock was up 2.4% to $507.80.

Charter’s broadband business is now nearing parity in terms of revenue for Charter -- rising 9.5% to $4.41 billion versus its legacy video business -- at $4.42 billion, growing 1%.  

Net subscriber additions for broadband were 563,000 -- up from 398,000 in the same period a year before. 

Analysts say the current concerns over COVID-19, with many stay-at-home state government orders still in force -- have led to rising broadband and media usage.

Charter's residential video customers declined 70,000 versus 152,000 a year ago. At the end of the first quarter -- March 31, 2020 -- Charter had 15.6 million residential video customers -- the second-biggest U.S. cable TV operator.

Looking at the broader picture, Charter maintained its total per residential monthly subscriber price -- which includes video, broadband, but not mobile-- at an average $112.73, up 0.2% versus the same period the year before.

Mobile business -- as with many cable/broadband companies -- continues to rise sharply, up 85% to $258 million. This comes at its landline voice -- also similar to other companies -- continues to sink, down 9% to $457 million.

Charter’s advertising sales were up 6% to $365 million, largely due to the rise in political advertising spending. Without political advertising, the percentage for advertising dropped 5.9%.

Total Charter revenue was up 4.8% to $11.7 billion. Net income attributable to Charter rose 56% to $396 million.