Six months after getting listed at the London Stock Exchange, Canal+ Group saw its share price rise by 9% to £2.19 per share on June 6 as it held its first general meeting and confirmed its outlook on 2025 revenue and EBITA — expected to reach $515 million in cash.
The company said in a release sent out prior to today’s general meeting that it expects its 2025 cash flow to exceed €500 million following the “progress made on the proposed restructuring plan” which have yielded “lower than expected disbursements.”
Canal+ announced last December a layoff plan to trim approximately 250 jobs. As many of 150 jobs are believed to be connected to the shuttering of its channel C8 whose frequency was discontinued by the French watchdog body Arcom, partly due to the controversial talk show “Touche pas à mon poste.” Canal+ also reduced its investment in local film production for the next three years from more than €600 million ($683 million) between 2022-2024 to €480 million. ($547 million).
The company, headed by CEO and chairman Maxime Saada, said it was “confident that the positive cash effects of its various other initiatives will start ramping up in 2026, including the renewed French cinema financing agreement, the decrease in costs in France and the profitability improvement of its new assets, Group Vivendi Africa and Dailymotion.”
Canal+ said it was also still on track to completes its long-gestated acquisition of MultiChoice, the leading PayTV operator in English and Portuguese-speaking Africa, as it awaits merger control clearance from the South African competition authorities. The deal was initially planned for April and has now been delayed by six months (to Oct. 8) due to local regulations.
“Once and if the proposed mandatory tender offer on MultiChoice Group is completed, the company will consider its capital allocation policy based on the actual outcome of the envisaged offer and the updated financial profile of the combined entity,” it said in a release ahead of the general meeting.
Canal+ Group also revealed it had settled its legal spat with the National Film Board (CNC) over a dispute on a tax that applies to television services and concerned past fiscal years. “The settlement removes uncertainty regarding the possibility of a material additional disbursement,” it said.
The company, which was previously listed as part of Vivendi, recently posted its first quarterly results as a standalone entity. For the first three months of 2025, the turnover of Canal+’s content and distribution division, which include Studiocanal and Dailymotion, was up by 8.2% to €158 million ($180 million) for the three months ending March 31, bolstered by the strong theatrical performances of “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy,” “Paddington in Peru” and “We Live in Time.”
As it continues to ramp up its international presence through acquisition and aggregation, Canal+ also unveiled its deal with Netflix to expand their distribution partnership – currently in place for France and Poland — to French-speaking sub-Saharan Africa. Going forward, Canal+ will distribute Netflix as part of its subscription bundle in 24 sub-Saharan African countries starting in July.
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