Nexstar Reduces CW Operating Losses by $119 Million, Surpassing Expectations
Nexstar has succeeded in its endeavor to reduce operating losses at The CW by $100 million by the end of 2024. During the company’s third quarter earnings report, Nexstar reported that operating losses for the broadcaster have been reduced by $119 million year-to-date.
Additionally, operating losses were reduced by $36 million year-over-year during the quarter. Because the company didn’t report operating losses for The CW in the third quarter of 2023, it’s unknown how much of a percentage difference that is. However, it does continue a trend as The CW also reported a $33 million year-over-year reduction in quarterly losses for the second quarter of 2024.
President and chief operating officer Michael Biard also shared that programming costs for The CW have been reduced by nearly 52% from when Nexstar acquired the broadcaster in 2022 to the third quarter of this year. Programming costs were $560 million in 2022 and are expected to be $270 million for 2024.
“Since we acquired The CW in the fourth quarter of 2022, we have transformed the profile of the network. We’ve increased the number of hours of total programming by over 40%, and now 46% of the programming hours The CW will deliver in 2025 will be sports and sports-related programming, including NASCAR, WWE, ACC football and basketball and PAC 12 football and more,” Nexstar CEO and chairman Perry Sook said during the Thursday earnings call. “We are accomplishing this with lower cost for programming that will generate higher viewership than the originals the network previously aired.”
Sook also highlighted some of The CW’s recent programming wins, including the Sept. 30 airing of the NASCAR Xfinity Series; that averaged 906,000 viewers, which were the highest ratings for the series since July. Additionally, on Oct. 5 — a day that included NASCAR Xfinity Series racing, ACC football and Pac-12 football — the network saw 4.7 million viewers tune into “a day on The CW, which had never existed before our ownership.”
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