NBCU Sees 2021 Peacock Revenue And Losses Climb, As 2022 Content Spend Grows

NBCUniversal’s Peacock grew revenue to $778 million for the full-year 2021 -- but more than doubled its losses to $1.7 billion.

The year before, in 2020, Peacock pulled in $118 million in revenue with a negative cash flow -- earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization -- of $663 million.

Comcast estimates Peacock losses will grow to $2.5 billion in 2022.

While Peacock says it had 24.5 million U.S. monthly active accounts at the end of 2021, it also said, in an earnings call with analysts that it has only 9 million paid subscribers. Still, factoring in advertising revenue, this yields average revenue per subscriber of $10 a month.

Peacock plans to double what it spends on producing content in 2022 -- to $3 billion. It plans to raise this sum in future years to $5 billion.

NBCUniversal's media segment -- TV and streaming -- witnessed post-pandemic revenues up 8.4% to $5.8 billion, largely due to gains in distribution and advertising revenue in the fourth quarter, growing 11.6% and 6%, respectively.

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Ad gains came from higher TV network pricing, as well as higher ad sales from its streamer Peacock.

At the same time, NBCU’s cash flow -- earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization -- sank 49% to $721 million. A large part of this is due to higher content spending for Peacock, as well as high sports TV rights fees for NBCU.

Overall, NBCUniversal -- media, studios, and theme parks -- witnessed 25.6% growth to $9.3 billion, due to overall rising post-pandemic business.

NBCU’s studio business -- content sales, theatrical revenues, and home entertainment -- soared 36% to $2.4 billion. Theme parks also benefited from rising post-pandemic attendance, up nearly 200% to $1.9 billion in revenue.

Home entertainment and other revenue grew 30.4%, including strong results from the theatrical movie “F9: The Fast Saga” and the return of stage plays. Theatrical revenue improved $80 million in the period, due to “Sing 2” and “Halloween Kills.”

Sky, NBCUniversal's European based TV broadcaster, posted 2.4% lower revenue to $5.1 billion as a result of lower content and direct-to-consumer revenue.

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