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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/macncheeseface on 2023-11-09 02:52:22.


Let’s put on our r/CFB MBA hats for a minute, because today Disney reported ESPN/sports financial results separately for the first time.

Here’s a few interesting nuggets from Disney’s Q4 financial results (Sports are on Page 6):

  • Domestic US ESPN had $3.455 Billion in revenue in Q4, up 1% over last year ($3.427 Billion)
  • Domestic US ESPN had $987 Million in profit in Q4, up 16% over last year ($850 Million)
  • ESPN+ has 26.0 Million subscribers at the end of September, up 3% (25.2 Million) at the end of July
  • Globally, sports had $17.111 Billion in revenue in FY23, down 1% over last year ($17.270 Billion)
  • Globally, sports had $2.475 Billion in profit in Q4, down 9% over last year ($2.710 Billion)
  • Globally, sports was 19% of Disney’s revenue and 19% of Disney’s profit

2 of the reasons they attributed to the increase in US operating income:

A decrease in programming and production costs reflecting lower college football costs attributable to the non-renewal of certain contracts

Growth in ESPN+ subscription revenue resulting from an increase in retail pricing and subscriber growth

tl;dr: a lot of people don’t understand the difference between “losing money” and “making a big ol’ pile of money, but wall street is pissed that it’s not as big as last year’s pile of money”