The advertising revenue was flowing at Fox Corp. to start the 2025 fiscal year. With the company gearing up for Election Day on Tuesday and the Super Bowl in February, Fox achieved record political advertising in 1Q25 and for the full fiscal year while also selling out inventory for the big game at record pricing. That fueled $1.33 billion in ad revenue for the quarter, which was also boosted by Tubi growth, higher ratings and pricing in the direct response marketplace for Fox News and the impact of Fox Sports’ “Summer of Soccer.”
Executive Chair/CEO Lachlan Murdoch said Fox saw a few different trends in political ad spending this cycle. In 2020, there was a sizeable shift toward spending on national campaigns rather than local. This election has seen things revert back to a more local and targeted approach, which has helped Fox’s station group in addition to Tubi with its capability to geotarget audience segments.
Murdoch made sure to sing the AVOD streamer’s praises during Monday’s earnings call for being a boon of strong political spending during the quarter. He noted that strong engagement and direct response growth led to 19% revenue growth for Tubi during 1Q25, adding that based on the current revenue run rate, Fox is looking for Tubi to eclipse the $1 billion revenue mark this fiscal year.
“This cycle, we have seen Tubi become a material recipient of political advertising,” Murdoch said. “Tubi’s large but hard-to-reach audience, coupled with its advanced targeting and geotargeting capabilities, have clearly differentiated Tubi as campaigns look to maximize reach and efficiency.”
Murdoch also played down any concerns of cannibalization between Tubi and Fox’s linear assets when it comes to advertising, indicating that actually the opposite is happening. “Tubi was able to capture money that, frankly, we couldn’t take entirely on the station. There’s such a tidal wave of political dollars to have much of that captured by Tubi as well—it’s really pleasing to see,” he said.
Speaking of Fox’s linear portfolio, Murdoch was asked for his take on last week’s news that Comcast NBCUniversal was looking into spinning off its cable networks. With Fox being a consistent defender of the video bundle, Murdoch pointed to the live sports it has on its networks—once again mentioning the Super Bowl ad sellout—as well as the programming Fox Entertainment produces as reasons for the company to remain confident in linear TV.
“I don’t think it affects us in any way at all,” the exec said. “From my perspective, I don’t see how we could ever do that. I think breaking apart part of the business would be very difficult, both from a cost point of view and from a revenue and a promotional synergy point of view.”
MoffettNathanson is also of the belief Fox will be just fine even if one of its partners looks to pivot its own strategy. “While the bulk of Fox still sits within the fading world of linear, its narrow focus on sports and news places it within islands of stability and even growth,” the firm said in a note. “As such Fox has captured, and should continue to capture, an increasing share of overall linear economics, both in terms of ad dollars and affiliate/retrans fees, as evidenced again by F1Q 2025 results.”
Murdoch briefly touched on the ongoing battle to get the Venu Sports jv off the ground following Fubo’s successful injunction. “Obviously we are awaiting our appeal of the injunction, and we’ll see where we go from there. We continue to believe Venu is a tremendous pro-consumer, pro-competition platform. We’re very excited to launch it when we have the ability to do so.”
Total revenue for 1Q25 came in at $3.56 billion, up 11% YOY. Affiliate fee revenues improved by 6% to $1.84 billion thanks to 10% growth in the TV segment and 3% growth in the cable network programming category. Net income was $832 million compared to the $415 million that was reported in 1Q24. Quarterly adjusted EBITDA was $1.05 billion—up 21% YOY.
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