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Comcast’s streaming platform continues to see downstream effects from its exclusive coverage of a Jan. 13 NFL Wild Card game, as Peacock closed out the first quarter of 2024 with nearly 34 million paying subscribers.
As part of the cable giant’s quarterly earnings report, Comcast revealed that it exited March with around 3 million more Peacock subs than was the case in the year-ago period. Revenue at the streaming segment improved 54% year-over-year to $1.1 billion, while losses narrowed to $639 million on the quarter, 9.2% lower than the $704 million lost during the analogous period in 2023.
Speaking to investors Thursday morning, Comcast president Michael Cavanagh credited the exclusive Dolphins-Chiefs game, which drew some 23 million viewers to Peacock, as a catalyst in the service’s recent growth spurt. “We’re very pleased with the quarter…where we ended at 33.5 million subscribers,” Cavanagh said. “The Wild Card game brought in a tremendous number of subs, ahead of where we expected it to be, and also retention was ahead of where we expected it to be.”
Cavanagh noted that while sign-ups are likely to lag in the current sports quarter, Peacock should pick up steam again beginning this summer, as the platform will stream all live events from the Paris Olympics. (NBCUniversal earlier this month said it expects to break its previous record of $1.25 billion in ad sales during its two-and-a-half-week sojourn in France.) After the Summer Games wind down, fans are expected to flock to Peacock’s football offerings, which include action from the Big Ten Conference as well as an NFL slate that features a Sept. 6 Eagles-Packers game from São Paolo, Brazil.
“We feel great about the progress we’re making and it’s very consistent with the way that we’ve described Peacock as taking our existing strengths and assets into a digital future,” Cavanagh said. “We are at a place now where we are really seeing traction in our approach to providing a service for consumers that is a combination of both entertainment and sports, and how those two go together.”
Earlier in the call, Cavanagh suggested that Peacock subs eventually could be in for a price hike. “Peacock has been on a great trajectory,” he said. “Our content offering provides such a great value proposition that we should have some real pricing power over time.”
Comcast said first-quarter revenue rose 1.2% to $30.1 billion and net profit increased 0.6% to $3.86 billion. Both metrics beat consensus estimates.
At the media division, NBCUniversal revenue rose 3.6% to $6.37 billion, while adjusted EBITDA fell 6.1% to $827 million. Advertising revenue was flat at $2.02 billion, and distribution revenue improved 7.2% to $2.91 billion on the quarter.
Comcast continued to lose ground on the legacy cable front, finishing the quarter with 13.6 million pay-TV customers. That marked a year-over-year loss of 12.3% from 15.5 million video subs, and a 3.5% sequential decline from 14.1 million customers at the end of 2023. The company continues to negotiate with Diamond Sports Group for a renewal of their carriage agreement, which expires on April 30.
Comcast now boasts some 32.2 million broadband subscribers, a tally which helped the connectivity and platforms unit rake in $20.3 billion on the quarter.