As linear cable TV network business continues its slow, nonstop decline, national TV advertising revenues will fall 4.9% by the end of this year to $22.4 billion, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. Cord-cutting by subscribers shifting to streaming platforms will continue for the next five years, which will result in national TV ad revenue falling under $20 billion by 2027.
Despite cord-cutting eroding the number of pay TV subscribers, station revenue from retransmission and carriage fees from distributors rose 3% to $14.46 billion in 2022, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence. S&P sees rate hikes in deals renewed in 2023 slightly outpacing the cord-cutting trend, resulting in a 3% gain in gross retransmission and subscriber fee revenues to $14.83 billion.
Media and telecom deals continued at an anemic pace at the end of 2022, with deal volume among U.S. and Canadian media and telecom companies declining 54.4% year over year in December to reach its lowest monthly total in 2022, according to a new data analysis by S&P Global Market Intelligence.
The total number of streaming-video-capable devices in the U.S. topped 10 figures in 2021 and will exceed 1.1 billion by 2025, S&P Global Market Intelligence reported. In a research note S&P said much of the credit for those one-billion-and-counting totals goes to a surge in connected-TV ownership — from 107.7 million sets in 2016, to 191.8 million in 2021 to a forecast 274.2 million in 2026.
S&P Global Market Intelligence analyzed the TV stations owned by 12 publicly traded companies, and estimates that they could generate from $6.99 billion to $12.99 billion in an 84 MHz at the low-end and 120 MHz at the high-end clearing scenario in the FCC Incentive Spectrum Auction, should it proceed as planned.
