When it comes to cable and television subscribers, much has been made of ESPN’s recent sizable losses. But make no mistake, this is not just a Bristol issue, although among all the channels at your disposal it effects them most because of their exponentially higher carriage fees. This is an issue that’s having an effect on the entire fabric of the cable and satellite industry.
Look no further than Dish, one of the major satellite companies in America. Via Variety comes some troubling news for the company as it again posted major losses in the third quarter of this year, continuing trends that show no sign of slowing down anytime soon.
Dish Network posted its tenth straight quarter of pay-TV subscriber losses — dropping a net 116,000 satellite video and Sling TV customers for the September quarter, as it continues to struggle against headwinds of fierce competition and cord-cutting trends.
At the same time, the Charlie Ergen-led company boosted net income 57%, to $307 million for the third quarter of 2016, with diluted earnings per share of 64 cents. Dish reported revenue of $3.75 billion for the most recent quarter, compared with $3.73 billion in Q3 2015. Wall Street had expected Dish to post earnings of 68 cents per share on revenue of $3.74 billion.
But it was the worst Q3 sub loss for Dish on record, after Dish shed approximately 23,000 in the third quarter of 2015, and follows the satcaster’s biggest quarterly loss ever in Q2 (of 281,000). Dish’s pay-TV figures combine satellite and the Sling TV over-the-top “skinny” bundles, indicating an accelerating decline in Dish’s satellite base.
Ten straight quarters of subscriber losses? That’s a streak that the Cleveland Browns would be proud of. And as we’ve learned with Disney and ESPN, it’s never a good sign when you fail to meet Wall Street expectations, no matter how much revenue you bring in.
The next layer to this story is what’s happening with the migration to skinny bundles. Dish, DirecTV, and other major cable and satellite giants have to continue to move in that direction and meet people where they are. Perhaps the most interesting figures in all of this is just how many customers have moved away from the traditional Dish lineup and gone to the company’s Sling TV.
During the third quarter, Dish lost 320,000 traditional satellite subscribers in Q3 — and has lost 949,000 over the past year, down 8.1% year over year, according to estimates by MoffetNathanson analyst Craig Moffett. That’s been only partially offset by Sling TV, which Moffett estimated added 204,000 subs in Q3 and 517,000 subscribers over the past four quarters.
While people moving to Sling can help offset some of the cord-cutting losses, that’s still almost a half million people that are unaccounted for in the net plus-minus totals. With so many people either shaving or cutting the cord, it’s hard to see where the bottoming-out point is for the satellite and cable industries.
[Variety]
