Soft Q1, Q2 2025 Sports Ad Market To Hit WBD: Analyst

Weak first- and second-quarter 2025 TV advertising trends -- mostly coming from sports -- are poised to hit Warner Bros. Discovery, according to one analyst.

Michael Morris, media analyst of Guggenheim Securities, points to “modestly softer advertising trends at networks and direct-to-consumer primarily reflecting weaker ratings for the NBA/NHL telecasts season-to-date.”

He estimates total WBD advertising revenues will decline 7.6% in the first quarter (to $1.97 billion) versus the same period the year earlier, and 7.2% in the second quarter (to $2.25 billion).

Looking specifically at its linear TV networks, revenues are projected to drop 11% (to $1.77 billion) and 10% (to $1.98 billion), respectively.

Direct-to-consumer platform revenue will grow 30% in the first quarter (to $228 million) and 25% the second quarter (to $300 million).

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WBD typically has its best quarterly advertising revenue in Q2 thanks to the NCAA “March Madness” Men’s College Basketball event and growing seasonal interest in the NBA.

Future sports-focused linear TV ad results will have more negative impact on the company.

Guggenheim sees total overall ad revenue for all of 2024 -- TV networks and D2C -- landing at $7.40 billion (down around 7% or so versus the year before) and then dramatically sinking deeper in 2025 -- 11% to $6.59 billion.

This decline will will be largely due to the absence of NBA programming, which will end on WBD networks (including TNT) at the end of this season.

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