Peacock narrows losses to $215m in Q1 as subscriber count rises to 41 million 

Global hit The Traitors airs on Peacock in the US

Comcast-owned Peacock reduced its losses to US$215m in the first quarter (Q1), compared with US$639m a year ago, as the streamer’s subscriber base grew to 41 million.

The subs total, up from around 36 million in the previous quarter, jumped after Comcast inked a deal with Charter that gave subscribers to the Spectrum TV Select service access to the ad-supported version of Peacock for no additional cost.

On the revenue front, the SVoD platform, which is behind American versions of The Traitors and Love Island, as well as crime drama Long Bright River, saw revenue climb 16% year-over-year to US$1.2bn in Q1.

In Comcast’s media segment, which includes the company’s US linear networks, Peacock and its international networks, revenue increased 1.1% to US$6.44bn in Q1.

Within that, revenue from international networks rose 14% to US$1.16bn, which Comcast attributed to growth in revenue associated with the distribution of sports networks. Meanwhile, domestic advertising fell 6.8% to US$1.89bn and domestic distribution was up 0.6% to US$2.92bn, with both sets of results reflecting increased revenue at Peacock and decreased revenue in the networks business. Adjusted earnings in the media segment were US$1bn in Q1.

In the studios segment, revenue was up 3% to US$2.83bn, with adjusted earnings of US$298m. Within the studios segment, content licensing was up 3.5% to US$2.17bn, theatrical revenue was down 13.3% to US$286m and its ‘other’ line item was up 17.5% to US$366m, which it attributed to digital sales of feature film Wicked.

Elsewhere, a Comcast exec said that its move to spin off seven of its cable networks – USA Network, CNBC, MSNBC, Oxygen, E!, SYFY and Golf Channel, in addition to digital assets Fandango, Rotten Tomatoes, GolfNow and SportsEngine – into a separate publicly traded entity, currently dubbed SpinCo, remains on course to be completed by the end of 2025.

Quizzed by analysts around whether there was concern that market volatility could trigger an advertising pullback, execs said they had not seen any evidence of that yet. They added that they were confident in their ability to attract ad dollars, given their deal to carry a package of NBA games begins later this year.