Comcast throws shareholders a bone, ‘disses cutomers with investment

In an move to quiet some very angry stockholders Comcast announced profits are up and declared a dividend:

Comcast’s stock has taken a beating of late for a variety of reasons. All the talk of FiOS has many of them worried, as did the looming (and so far unfounded) rumor that the company was interested in making a major wireless broadband play. But the company’s fussy investors got a gift this morning with Comcast’s fourth quarter earnings results, which bested most analysts’ estimates. The company reported higher than expected profit for Q4, and announced a new annual dividend payout for shareholders.

Comcast Corp. announced plans for its first dividend in nearly a decade and committed to a timeline for buying back nearly $7 billion in stock, a salve to investor complaints the cable giant isn’t friendly to shareholders. The moves Thursday come as Comcast’s stock price has withered and just a month after one of the company’s biggest investors accused Comcast of a litany of missteps and called on the company to commit to shareholder givebacks, including a dividend. (from Broadband Reports)

The company has been performing a well choreographed tapdance before the FCC trying to explain that they really are delivering service as promised to consumers even though they are not.

Just to let cutomers know that the company is fully committed to creating a robust network capable of delivering a 21st century level of broadband access, they are rumored to be investing $175 million in social networking loser Plaxo. I for one wonder how fiber nodes could be upgraded, how many more DOCSIS 3 loops could be deployed or how much better a dividend could be paid out with the same said $175 million.