The sports segment of media and entertainment behemoth Walt Disney has recorded a 3% rise in annual revenues during the 2024 financial year, but has also seen its operating income fall.
Disney reported both its Q4 results (for the three months up to September 28, 2024) and full-year results yesterday (November 14), with the sports division – including heavyweight broadcaster ESPN – securing full-year income of $17.6 billion, up from $17.1 billion in 2023.
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However, that sector ended up seeing operating income decrease by 5% in this quarter and by 2% for the whole year, dropping (annually) from $2.46 billion to $2.4 billion.
Q4 operating income also fell, from $981 million to $929 million, with ESPN only generating $896 million during that period as opposed to $953 million the prior year.
Quarterly sports revenue, meanwhile, stayed flat, moving only from $3.91 billion to $3.914 billion (although ESPN’s grew by 1%). Internationally, the sports division of the Star India broadcaster currently owned by Disney – although a merger between Disney Star and the Reliance conglomerate has just been approved – saw its revenues drop by 37% in Q4.
Disney have said that the fall in ESPN operating income during the quarter was down to a combination of higher programming and production costs across US college football (partially offset by lower NFL rights costs), and lower affiliate revenue due to lower subscriber numbers.
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By GlobalDataHowever, domestic ESPN advertising revenue did grow by 7% in the quarter versus the same period in 2023.
The ESPN+ streaming service, meanwhile, hit subscriber numbers of 25.6 million at the end of Q4, meanwhile, up from 24.9 million at the end of Q3 in June.
In terms of guidance for the sports segment, meanwhile, Disney is predicting a 13% rise in reported operating income in 2025.
For Disney’s overall direct-to-consumer (DTC) segment – comprising ESPN+ and the DTC offerings in its entertainment division – revenue increased 13% year-on-year for Q4 and by 14% over the full year.
Prices on most plans for the ESPN+, Hulu, and Disney+ services were hiked last month.
Revenue was $24.9 billion during the last 12 months, up from $21.9 billion last year.
That segment also brought in operating income for the year of $134 million, as opposed to a $2.6 billion loss in 2023.
In terms of Disney’s DTC operations, in September FuboTV won a preliminary injunction against Venu Sports, the joint venture that was being formed to house the collective sports rights of the Fox Corp, Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), and Disney media giants.
The service had been scheduled to launch during the last few months of this year but that has now been delayed significantly after a trial date of October 6, 2025, was set to resolve the Fubo-Venu dispute.
Overall, Walt Disney’s annual revenue increased from $88.8 billion in 2023 to $91.3 billion for the 2024 financial year, with net income rising from $3.3 billion to $5.7 billion.
For the fourth quarter, revenue increased by 6% to $22.5 billion.
Bob Iger, chief executive at The Walt Disney Company, said: “As a result of our strategies and our focus on managing our businesses for both the near- and long-term, we are differentiating ourselves from traditional competitors, leveraging the deepest and broadest set of entertainment assets in the industry to drive attractive returns and further advance our goals.”
