Recently, a major financial institution downgraded Fox News owner Fox Corporation’s stock over concerns regarding the company’s performance. Reportedly, analysts are keying in on issues with Fox Corporation’s viewership, earnings, and content. A Wells Fargo analyst downgraded the company’s stock from “equal weight” to “underweight”.
Steven Cahall, a Wells Fargo Equity Analyst, stated, “Fox News is the FOXA cash cow at [around] 80 percent of our FY24E EBITDA. Viewership is down -19% Jan-June’23 vs Jan-June’21 due to cord cutting and/or programming.” EBITDA stands for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization and is widely used as a proxy for corporate profitability. Cahall reduced Fox Corporation’s target share price from $35 to $31.
The analyst holds concerns about the future of Fox’s profitability metrics, considering industry trends, consumer preferences, and Fox New’s declining performance. “Fox Cable could soon go ex-growth on EBITDA like we’ve seen for peer linear nets. TV has better topline growth, but less ability to reduce costs due to sports rights,” Cahall said.
Cahall further pointed out that Fox News has lost substantial market share in the cable news industry. Reports indicate that Fox News comprised 52 percent of cable primetime viewership between 2020 and 2022. This figure was 51 percent as of January 2023. However, Fox News now only represents roughly 38 percent of primetime cable news viewership as of June 2023. Furthermore, Fox News was the unquestionable king of conservative news viewership. This has now fallen 10 percent.
The data correlates with Tucker Carlson’s sudden exit from Fox News in late April. Tucker Carlson was unquestionably the most popular personality on the news channel, and the incredible crash in Fox News ratings following his departure supports this.
The Vigilant Fox, a popular journalism Twitter account, succinctly stated, “For many years, Tucker was the sole reason why a lot of people continued to watch Fox News. “Fox sucks, but at least they let Tucker do his thing.” Now that Tucker is gone, there is no more appeal. And Fox News’ financials are going down the toilet.”
For many years, Tucker was the sole reason why a lot of people continued to watch Fox News.
“Fox sucks, but at least they let Tucker do his thing.”
Now that Tucker is gone, there is no more appeal. And Fox News’ financials are going down the toilet.https://t.co/d4xwvHjkpE
— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) July 10, 2023
The American Tribune recently wrote about Fox News’ massive decline in ratings following Tucker’s firing, where the new channel reportedly lost nearly almost one-third of its total viewers and nearly half of its key advertising demographic. Moreover, Fox New saw its weekly ratings fall below woke MSNBC’s for the first time in five years.
According to consistent historical ratings data, Fox News dominated the cable news market for years leaving leftist competitors behind in the dust. Now, as soon as Tucker leaves, Fox News ratings have been crashing like Bud Light sales.
Tucker Carlson also recently broke his silence about his departure from Fox News during an interview with Russell Brand. The former host explained that while he was not expecting to be fired, he wasn’t entirely shocked when he received the news in April. Carlson stated, “I was surprised I didn’t, you know, expect to get fired that morning at all in April. So I was shocked, but I wasn’t really shocked.”
Carlson also said he harbors no negative feelings toward Fox News following his exit from the company. Tucker also maintains that he doesn’t know the exact reason he was ousted from the company. Regardless, he is still popular as ever with his new Twitter-exclusive show.
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