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Cable Prepares for the Value Extraction Era

With the once-unprofitable streaming business finally turning a corner, NBCU, Disney, and WBD are all openly telegraphing what seems increasingly inevitable: spinning off or selling declining TV assets while there’s still value to extract. Enter private equity, an industry that knows a thing or two about value extraction…

Bob Iger needs to find a partner to offload Disney's declining TV networks.
Revenue at Disney’s legacy TV networks declined another 6 percent last quarter, to $2.46 billion, while profit plunged 38 percent, to $498 million. That’s still double the profit generated by the streaming segment, but the two businesses are racing in opposite directions. Photo: Jerod Harris/Getty Images
William D. Cohan
November 17, 2024

On Thursday’s quarterly earnings call, Bob Iger celebrated a hard-earned milestone: Disney’s streaming business, which has been bleeding money since its inception—it lost $2.61 billion in 2023 alone—is finally turning a profit. Investors rewarded Disney by sending shares up 16 percent for the week. It was, as my partner Matt Belloni wrote, Iger’s “Netflix moment,” the first time it seemed undeniable that Disney would survive its digital transition.