Major gains from heavy fourth-quarter NFL and political advertising were key in lifting Fox Corp.'s advertising revenue by 21% to $2.4 billion.
Taking out political ad business, Fox’s core advertising was up 11%.
Fox’s Tubi -- its free advertising-supported streaming platform -- continues to soar, up 31% in the last three months of 2024. For its most recent 12-month period, Tubi grew 22% to $1.1 billion.
With strong NFL, Major League Baseball, and political ad business, Fox’s overall television unit -- which includes Tubi -- was up 19% to $2.0 billion in ad revenue.
Company-wide affiliate revenue was up 6% to $1.9 billion.
Looking more narrowly, media analyst at Madison & Wall Brian Wieser estimates Fox’s national TV networks' business grew “by around 8% with Fox News Channel likely accounting for most of this growth.”
advertisement
advertisement
Fox Corp.’s cable networks group overall ad sales were up 32% to $460 million.
Fox News Channel continues to be a major focus of the company.
Political advertising probably helped, but management indicated that since the election they have observed many new advertisers spending on the network.” Wieser says.
He adds: “As we have seen in other instances over the past couple of months, marketers are far less likely to take actions that might cause them to be perceived as political actors; this will likely be favorable for Fox News.”