NBCU 'Quietly' Sold Its $500M Snap Inc. Stake Last Year
- by Karlene Lukovitz @KLmarketdaily, March 10, 2020
NBCUniversal sold off its entire equity stake in Snap Inc. last year, according to parent Comcast’s January 31 10-K filing.
The declaration of the sale — a $500-million investment made by NBCU made in March 2017 — was spotted by The Hollywood Reporter, which notes that the company also made similar investments in BuzzFeed and Vox Media at the time.
The company, which recorded a $293-million gain on the sale for fiscal 2019, had lost $263 million on it in fiscal 2018, when Snap’s stock dropped after its IPO.
Like rival entertainment giant ViacomCBS, which is selling off “non-core” assets like Simon & Schuster and CBS’s Blackrock HQ to help fuel its streaming services strategy, Comcast/NBCU needs cashflow to help support the $2-billion launch of its Peacock streaming service.
