Comcast Corp

Comcast Corp. and 10 other cable-television system owners agreed to follow new guidelines for reporting certain operating figures, a move designed to give investors better information for evaluating the companies. The guidelines won't replace generally accepted accounting principles or affect financial statements. Instead, executives said they are seeking to eliminate inconsistencies in how their companies report operating statistics such as subscriber counts and capital expenditures.

The Federal Trade Commission has fined Comcast Corp. Chief Executive Brian Roberts $500,000 to settle antitrust charges. The fine arises from Roberts' violation of an agreement he made with the U.S. Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission after Comcast bought AT&T's cable systems in 2002. Roberts had agreed to acquire shares in Comcast up until 2007. After that, he was required to give notice any time he received more company stock. However, he continued to receive Comcast securities after that date without notifying the agency.

Stephen Burke, president of Comcast Corp.'s cable division, was named to the additional post of chief operating officer of the nation's biggest cable television company. Burke will remain as head of Comcast Cable, which will operate with a restructured leadership team. Before coming to Comcast in 1998, Burke was an executive with Walt Disney Co., where he was president of ABC Broadcasting. Shares of Philadelphia-based Comcast fell 70 cents to $27.26 on Nasdaq.

Comcast Corp.'s NBC Sports Group has scored a broadcast-and-cable-rights deal with Major League Soccer, its latest move in a push to compete more aggressively against ESPN and Fox Sports. Although Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN is still the primary home of Major League Soccer and carries most of the major games, the new MLS partnership is a blow to News Corp.'s Fox Sports, whose package was acquired by NBC Sports. Spanish-language broadcaster Univision also has MLS rights. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but people familiar the matter put the price tag between $10 million and $12 million a year over three years.

Comcast Corp.'s planned $56-billion purchase of AT&T Corp.'s cable television business cleared a regulatory hurdle at the Justice Department, the companies said. The waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino antitrust act expired at midnight. The Federal Communications Commission still must approve the acquisition. Special Class A shares of Philadelphia-based Comcast rose 43 cents to $23.73 on Nasdaq. AT&T shares rose 31 cents to $12.63 on the NYSE.

A Seattle-area woman has sued Comcast Corp. for disclosing her name and contact information. Dawnell Leadbetter said she was contacted by a debt collection agency in January and told to pay $4,500 for downloading copyright-protected music or face a lawsuit. Leadbetter, a mother of two teenage children, was a subscriber to Comcast's high-speed Internet access. She said the agency was able to track her down using information that the Recording Industry Assn.

Comcast Corp., the nation's largest cable operator, reported a 54% gain in fourth-quarter profit on solid revenue gains that were boosted by acquisitions and customers' increased spending for cable TV. In a bow to the desires of agitated shareholders unhappy with its weakened stock price, Comcast also said it would start paying a 6.25-cent quarterly dividend beginning at the end of April that is expected to increase over time. Comcast's stock was up $1.43 to $19.24.

Comcast Corp. has won the right to buy Time Warner Inc.'s controlling stake in cable's E! Entertainment Television, the celebrity news network, for $321 million. Comcast, the nation's fourth-largest cable company, said it should decide by early next month whether to proceed. Philadelphia-based Comcast is one of five cable operators that are partners in the network. Late last year, they kicked off the process for a change in ownership. E!, which is 58.

Comcast Corp.'s Brian Roberts wasn't rolling out the red carpet this week when Walt Disney Co. pulled into Philadelphia for its annual shareholders meeting. In fact, the chief executive of the Philadelphia-based cable giant that has launched an unsolicited takeover bid for Disney wasn't even in town. Roberts and 500 of the company's top brass were huddled at the Arizona Biltmore Resort & Spa in Phoenix for a long-planned three-day retreat.

Comcast Corp. posted third-quarter net income of $75.6 million, or 8 cents a share, an improvement over its net loss of $106.8 million, or 11 cents a share, for the same period last year. Revenue at the Philadelphia-based cable television system operator was up 12.7% to $2.7 billion for the period. Comcast also said that it expects to complete its merger with AT&T Corp.'s cable unit next month. The deal, which the companies value at $47.

Private equity firm Blackstone Group is looking to unload its stake in Universal Orlando, triggering a chain of events that could put the entire resort ? which is in the midst of its most impressive financial run ever ? on the auction block. Blackstone has offered to sell its half of the resort to co-owner NBCUniversal, the media and entertainment conglomerate that was acquired in January by Comcast Corp. NBCUniversal has until June 12 to accept the offer and buy out the private equity firm.

Cable news channel MSNBC ended its turbulent relationship with its most-popular anchor, Keith Olbermann, with a terse statement saying that Friday night's show was his last. In a six-minute farewell sign-off at the end of "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," the forceful liberal commentator didn't volunteer a reason for his abrupt departure from the channel that became an ideological counterbalance to the rival Fox News Channel. The only hint Olbermann offered for his exit was an admission that over the last couple of years there were "many occasions" when the noise and heat surrounding the show "was just too much for me. " But, he added, it was a supportive, unwearying audience that "required that I keep going.

Comcast Corp. and General Electric Co. announced Sunday that Comcast's No. 2 executive, Steve Burke, would become chief executive of NBC Universal when the merger of the two companies is completed. Burke, 52, will succeed Jeff Zucker, who announced Friday that he would step down when Philadelphia-based Comcast assumes control of GM, which is expected to happen late this year or early 2011. Zucker will stay on for the next few months and work with Burke to attempt a smooth transition.

In one of the largest office leases of the year in Southern California, broadcaster Comcast Entertainment Group has agreed to continue renting nearly five floors in the Wilshire Courtyard complex in the Miracle Mile district of Los Angeles. Most of Comcast Entertainment's 355,000 square feet is occupied by its E Entertainment Television Inc. subsidiary. Financial details of the 10-year lease with landlord RREEF Real Estate weren't disclosed, but based on asking rents in the Wilshire Boulevard complex, the deal is worth close to $130 million.

Cable giant Comcast Corp., in a filing with the Federal Communications Commission seeking regulatory approval of its $30-billion deal to take control of General Electric's NBC Universal, said it didn't expect the transaction to significantly change the media landscape. The 145-page document accompanying a joint request by the companies to transfer control of NBC's TV station licenses, argued that there was "no plausible basis for claims that the proposed venture will have anti-competitive effects."

The Department of Justice, in a major antitrust review for the Obama administration, will join the Federal Communications Commission in reviewing Comcast Corp.'s deal to take control of General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal. The decision settles a tug of war between the department and the Federal Trade Commission, each of which sought to weigh in on the $30-billion deal announced in December. But other recent big media mergers have been swung to Justice Department lawyers, so the decision did not come as a surprise to regulatory insiders.

Comcast Corp. plans to sell most of its stake in C3, the programming company it formed two years ago, to partner Richard Frank, the former head of Walt Disney Television. Frank said he has exercised an option to buy out Comcast and that controlling C3 will give him greater flexibility in striking alliances more suitable for the programming C3 will continue to pursue, such as series for prime time and cable. Frank declined to disclose the terms of the deal.

Comcast Corp. got the green light Wednesday to become the nation's biggest cable operator as government regulators approved its $30-billion acquisition of AT&T Corp.'s cable television business. In a 3-1 vote, the Federal Communications Commission ruled that the deal would not harm consumers, may stabilize cable prices and should spur the deployment of new services, such as high-speed Internet access.

It's been a good month for Comcast Corp.'s Steve Burke: Last week he received a new five-year contract as the cable giant's chief operating officer, and on Tuesday he was named to the board of Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Comcast said Burke's new contract recognized his responsibilities as the executive who will oversee NBC Universal after the media firm merges into the cable company. In a regulatory filing, Comcast said the deal, signed Dec. 16, will keep Burke at Comcast until 2014.

Cable operator Comcast Corp. said it would make its experimental Web TV service available to millions of its subscribers who pay for high-speed Internet access and television, paving the way for people to watch cable shows online. The newly christened Fancast Xfinity TV service allows subscribers to watch full-length television shows from 27 networks -- including pay cable offerings HBO, Cinemax and Starz -- on their computers. The cable giant is aggressively rolling out the online service, which it tested with 5,000 customers over the summer.