Paramount beats earnings expectations for Q1 with its WBD megadeal on the horizon
· Business Insider
Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images
- Paramount Skydance impressed investors in its first-quarter earnings report.
- The company's earnings came in above expectations.
- Paramount+ added about 700,000 subscribers last quarter, its first with live UFC matches in the US.
Paramount Skydance pleased investors in its first earnings report since agreeing to buy Warner Bros. Discovery.
Visit afnews.co.za for more information.
David Ellison's company beat Wall Street's expectations last quarter, thanks to an 11% jump in streaming revenue.
Paramount's revenue rose 2% to $7.35 billion in the first quarter, at the upper end of the $7.15 billion to $7.35 billion range the company had said it expected. Analysts polled by Bloomberg were looking for first-quarter revenue of $7.26 billion.
The company's adjusted EBITDA — a common profitability measure — came in at $1.16 billion, above the $900 million to $1 billion range it set and ahead of analysts' $891 million estimate.
Shares rose over 4% in early after-hours trading. The stock finished Monday down about 6% since the Paramount-Skydance merger closed in August. It has lost nearly half its value from last fall's all-time high.
The company's revenue guidance for the second quarter came in slightly below analyst estimates, per Bloomberg's poll. Paramount reiterated its full-year revenue guidance of $30 billion.
Paramount's TV business shrank about 6% year over year to under $3.7 billion, as cord-cutting continues to ravage media companies. However, Paramount said star showrunner Taylor Sheridan's "The Madison" was his strongest streaming debut ever, with 12.5 million viewers in its first month.
"We are pleased with the trajectory of our business as we continue to invest in key areas of growth, drive greater efficiency across the enterprise and position the company for long-term success," wrote Ellison, Paramount's CEO, in his first-quarter shareholder letter.
UFC fights lure subscribers
Paramount+ added 700,000 subscribers last quarter as it began showing live UFC matches in the US without pay-per-view, as part of a seven-year, $7.7 billion deal. However, the company said it would have added 1.9 million if not for its decision to exit a bundle internationally.
Business Insider reported in January that Paramount+ generated about 1 million signups on the day of its first UFC match.
Paramount's namesake streamer now has 79.6 million subscribers, which is ahead of US-only Peacock's 46 million but well behind its top rivals. Disney had 196 million streaming customers when it last shared subscriber figures in September 2025, while Netflix said it had 325 million customers as of the end of 2025.
Buying WBD would help Paramount's flagship streamer scale, since the HBO parent had 131.6 million streaming customers at the end of 2025.
The Paramount-WBD mega-merger, which has faced opposition from Hollywood stars like JJ Abrams and Ben Stiller, still needs official regulatory approval in the US and abroad.
Turning to tech
Ellison is prioritizing technology and streaming in hopes of remaking his century-old media company into a powerhouse for the new era.
As part of this push, Paramount has made key hires like former Google exec Hugh Williams, who was nicknamed "the godfather of doomscrolling," as well as Amazon's former video ad sales chief.
Ellison said on the earnings call that Paramount is trying to hire high-end talent in engineering and AI talent to put the company "in a position to compete with the leaders in the industry."
"It's that combination of art and technology working hand-in-hand together that drive growth, that drive engagement, and all of the key metrics that are required to building a truly scaled business," Ellison said.
Paramount's streaming business made strides last year, as global viewing hours grew more than 20% across Paramount+ and Pluto TV, according to leaked figures obtained by Business Insider.
The company is also turning to short-form video to keep users engaged and "drive visit frequency," a streaming employee told Business Insider. Besides a short-form feed, Paramount has explored adding user-generated content and shopping features to its streamer.
Paramount+ and Pluto TV's tech platforms will come together by the middle of the year, which the company said will "enable continuous optimization across discovery, personalization, and monetization." Paramount has shuffled key engineering teams as part of this process, which is known internally as "convergence."
Read the original article on Business Insider