Viacom 4Q earnings, revenue up on 'Transformers'

(AP) -- Viacom says it turned the success of "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" into a pile of money in its latest quarter, as earnings tripled and revenue grew 22 percent.

Viacom Inc., the owner of Paramount Pictures, MTV and Comedy Central, earned $576 million, or $1 per share in the July to September quarter. That's triple the $189 million, or 31 cents per share, it earned in the same period last year.

Excluding special items, adjusted earnings were $1.06 cents per share in the fiscal fourth quarter, 3 cents about the average analyst estimate as polled by FactSet.

Viacom, based in New York, says its revenue rose 22 percent to $4.05 billion from $3.33 billion. Analysts polled by FactSet were been expecting $3.75 billion.