• by Wayne Friedman , Yesterday

Core NBCUniversal domestic advertising -- excluding the Milan Cortina Olympics and the Super Bowl -- grew 4.7% to $1.5 billion in the first quarter of this year.

The increase was largely driven by a new NBA programming deal for NBCU -- including major gains from streaming platform Peacock. Peacock now represents 26% of overall NBCU ad revenues.

The Milan Cortina Olympics pulled in $1.16 billion in advertising revenue, while the 2026 Super Bowl brought $758 million.

Excluding those big sports programming events, “domestic advertising revenue increased primarily due to higher revenue at Peacock, partially offset by lower revenue at our networks,” according to a Comcast Corp. earnings release.

In the previous fourth-quarter period, NBC witnessed an overall core domestic advertising increase of 1.5%, with just over $1.9 billion in advertising coming from the Olympics and the Super Bowl.

Domestic distribution revenues were up 37% in the period to $2.3 billion, largely driven by high revenues for Peacock. Without Olympic gains, revenue rose 12%.

Overall NBCUniversal revenue climbed 61%, driven by the Olympics and Super Bowl, to $7.3 billion. At the same time, NBCU’s operating expenses soared 74% to $7.7 billion, fueled by NBA and sports programming.

Comcast’s broadband and video business continue to show weakness. Domestic broadband is down 5.1% to $6.3 billion, with video subscriber revenues down 8% to $6.3 billion.

Video subscribers dropped 9% to 10.95 million year-over-year, and broadband subscribers were down 2% to 28.65 million.

On the positive side Comcast Corp. systems advertising revenue grew 3% to $951 million -- including that of its FreeWheel ad tech/ad serving platform business.

Overall, analysts say Comcast revenues beat expectations, with broadband losses improving.

In mid-day Thursday stock market trading, Comcast Corp. shares were 8% higher to $31.68.