Disney: Big Screen = Big Profits in 2010

Toy Story 3

BURBANK, Calif. (TheStreet) -- Disney(DIS) surpassed Wall Street targets with its fourth-quarter earnings, lifted by its television businesses.

The company, one of the purest gauges of discretionary spending among U.S. consumers, said its net income amounted to $844 million, or 44 cents a share, essentially flat with the year-ago quarter. Excluding items related to the sale of a stake in a European television service, Disney said it would have earned 47 cents a share in the quarter.

The Wall Street target, according to a Thomson Reuters poll of analysts, was 38 cents a share.

Overall revenue, Disney said, rose 1% to $9.74 billion, which barely edged out the consensus $9.66 billion forecast by Wall Street analysts.

The closest the company came to providing an outlook were the prepared remarks of CEO Robert Iger, who touted the slate of movies Disney has scheduled for release in the coming weeks and months.

Iger said he was "excited" about the company's "creative pipeline." He singled out the Tim Burton vehicle Alice in Wonderland and the latest Pixar confection Toy Story 3. The company's 2010 box-office hopes have long rested on these two offerings.