TWC Adds 36,000 Video Subscribers

UPDATED: Never mind the global economic meltdown — we want our TV!

Pretty impressive: Time Warner Cable posted 36,000 net new basic video subscribers in Q1, along with 225,000 net adds on high-speed Internet and 166,000 on phone. (Earnings release here.)

That’s after Verizon added 299,000 FiOS TV subscribers in Q1, and AT&T packed on 284,000 for U-verse TV in quarter.

So where in the blazes are all these TV customers coming from? AT&T said 60% of its U-verse subs were from cable competitors, so perhaps Comcast is feeling the pinch there. (Comcast reports tomorrow morning.)

Another potential loser: Dish Network, which had a net drop of 102,000 subs in Q4 and saw its AT&T deal expire in January. Dish, which reports first quarter earnings May 11, just announced the reorganization of its senior management team.

[UPDATE: Credit Suisse analyst Spencer Wang offers another suggestion on TWC’s net video adds specifically: “We believe that the digital transition was a major driver of this quarter’s positive basic net adds, and would not expect positive basic net adds to continue over the longer term,” he wrote in a note to investors this morning.]

Look for full coverage of TWC earnings later today on Multichannel.com.