Disney rescued by the Avengers

The success of the film The Avengers in the global box office has helped studio Disney ....

15:20 11 August 2012

The success of the film The Avengers in the global box office has helped studio Disney get back on its feet. The film helped the entertainment giant make its biggest quarterly profit ever. 

 

This raised the value of Disney’s shares by as much as 31%, raising pre-tax profits to $3.01 billion in the past three months leading up to June. 

 

The ensemblesuperhero movie titled 'Avengers Assemble' in the UK featured several big names in the industry, including Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, and Chris Hemsworth. The film broke US box office records on its opening weekend alone. Its global sales reached up to $1.5 billion. 

 

Bob Iger, chairman and chief executive at Disney, also revealed that the new animated film Brave contributed to what he called a ‘phenomenal’ quarter. 

 

Another contributor was Disney’s theme park, especially a new resort the company opened in Tokyo. 

 

While other parts of Disney’s operations are peaking, some areas are also experiencing further slumps. One of these is the home entertainment division, which is continuously struck by declining revenues as more and more people are taking to online and digital sources and are no longer investing that much in home DVDs. 

 

The Disney Interactive division also tumbled in profits by up to 22%. Disney blames this on the availability of free and cheap online and social media games. 

 

Disney’s performance this quarter is a stark contrast to the previous quarter when the company’s movie division reported an operating loss caused by the big budget sci-fi film John Carter, which flopped at the box office.