Warner Bros. Discovery reported lower Q4 sales and earnings, “underscoring the challenges the media giant is confronting as it weighs competing takeover bids” from Paramount Skydance and Netflix. Revenue during Q4 declined 6% to $9.46B. Adjusted EBITDA “shrank to” $2.22B. Still, both “were better than Wall Street expectations.” Revenue for WBD’s TV networks, its biggest segment, which includes CNN and TNT, fell 12% to $4.2B due to “lower ad sales and distribution revenue.” Adjusted EBITDA fell 27% to $1.41B. WBD lost the U.S. media rights to NBA games this season, a move that “hurt TV viewership.” Sales in the streaming business rose 5% to $2.79B, thanks in part to “growth in advertising and a slate of content including the buzzy Canadian hockey story ‘Heated Rivalry.’” HBO Max “added 3.5 million more subscribers quarter-over-quarter,” bringing the total to 131.6 million globally (BLOOMBERG NEWS, 2/26).
WBD CEO David Zaslav and CEO/Global Streaming & Games JB Perrette “talked up the potential of upcoming slates” for Warner Bros. and HBO Max and the future of Discovery Global linear channels Thursday morning in an earnings conference call that “awkwardly avoided the biggest question of hovering over the studio” (VARIETY, 2/26).
