: Paramount slashes quarterly dividend by 79%, stock plummets

Paramount Global Inc. PARA will slash its quarterly dividend to 5 cents a share from 24 cents a share, the media giant announced Thursday. This “updated dividend policy we have announced today will further enhance our ability to deliver long-term value for our shareholders as we move toward streaming profitability,” Chief Executive Bob Bakish said in a release. Shares of Paramount were off 15% in premarket trading Thursday. The announcement came alongside Paramount’s first-quarter earnings, which brought a net loss of $1.1 billion, or $1.74 a share, whereas the company posted net earnings of $433 million, or 64 cents a share, in the year-earlier quarter. Paramount lost $1.81 a share from continuing operations, whereas it earned 58 cents a share on the metric a year before. The company saw 9 cents in adjusted earnings per share, down from 60 cents a year prior and below the FactSet consensus, which was for 17 cents a share. Revenue slipped to $7.27 billion from $7.33 billion, while analysts had modeled $7.41 billion.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.