Fox Corp. reports $50 million net loss following Dominion settlement

Fox Corp., the parent company of Fox News, reported a net loss of $50 million in the first quarter of 2023, just weeks after it paid a historic settlement to Dominion Voting Systems.

The company reported total quarterly revenues of $4.08 billion, representing an 18 percent increase from the $3.46 billion reported in the prior year for the first quarter. In last year’s first quarter, Fox Corp. reported a net profit of $290 million.

The conservative media giant agreed to pay Dominion a massive $787.5 million settlement late last month to forgo a jury trial after the voting systems provider hit it with a blockbuster defamation lawsuit stemming from Fox’s airing of false statements about its software being promoted by former President Trump and his allies after the 2020 election.

“We always acted as a news organization reporting on the newsworthy events of the day,” Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch said on an investor call Tuesday, CNN reported. “Now we have been and remain confident in the merits of our position that the First Amendment protects a news organization’s reporting and allegations being made by a sitting president of the United States. However, the Delaware court severely limited our defenses and trial through pre-trial rulings.”

Murdoch also on Tuesday, for the first time, publicly acknowledged the network’s ouster of top host Tucker Carlson, whose private communications were made public as part of the Dominion lawsuit. Carlson’s text messages, some of which reportedly disparaged network leadership and its editorial strategy, have produced a spate of embarrassing headlines for the company in recent weeks.

“There is no change to our programming strategy at Fox News,” Murdoch said. “As always, we are adjusting our programming and lineup and that is what we continue to do.”