The impact of the loss of the NBA on TNT Sports parent company Warner Bros. Discovery is now in full view.
An earnings report released early Thursday for WBD’s fiscal second quarter said that revenue fell 11% to $8.7 billion, below Wall Street expectations, while net income plummeted 91% to $149 million. The springtime period for the second quarter coincides with the NBA playoffs, something that TNT Sports didn’t have this year as the NBA began new rights deals with Amazon, ESPN, and NBC Sports.
WBD said the absence of the NBA cut heavily into advertising revenue across multiple platforms. In particular, the company pointed to a 22% drop in linear advertising, with the loss of live NBA content responsible for nearly all of that drop.
“[The NBA] has been obviously a negative driver on ad revenues, a positive driver on profits in the second quarter, as much or more so even than in the first quarter,” WBD CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels said on the earnings call with analysts.
To his point, WBD’s operating expenses for its linear networks improved by 30% year over year because of the removal of fees for NBA live rights.
