More on WWE’s Fiscal First Quarter Report, Network Subs & Streaming Deal Update, Saudi Status, WWE 2K21

As noted before, WWE held an investors meeting on Thursday to discuss the results from their 2020 fiscal first quarter report.

Fiscal First Quarter Revenues and Profits

WWE announced that they generated around $291 million in revenues and $24.145 million in profits for the fiscal quarter, which were up compared to last year’s first quarter revenues of $182.448 million and a net loss in profits of $7.636 million.

Dave Meltzer reported in this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter that the reason for the sizable increase in WWE’s stock price following the release of their report was due to Wall Street experts had been expecting around $264.3 million in revenues and $19.3 million in profits, which WWE managed to surpass both expectations.

Meltzer also reported that the main reason for the rise in revenues and profits was due to WWE’s new television deals for RAW, SmackDown, and NXT all went into effect this year. Meltzer reported that while the lower than expected United Kingdom television deal was included in this fiscal report, the new India television deal was not and WWE’s fiscal second quarter likely will also see a sizable increase in revenues and profits.

Other Company Financial Areas

WWE reported that live events for their fiscal first quarter had a net loss of around $3.2 million compared to the net loss of $200,000 for the same fiscal quarter last year.

Consumer products revenue reportedly declined from $20.762 million to $16.922 million for the past two fiscal first quarters.

Licensing revenue reportedly declined by around 18% from $9.4 million to $7.7 million for the past two fiscal first quarters. Meltzer reported that this was due to lower sales of WWE branded toys and video games although mobile game sales did increase by around 10% but it was not enough to cover the gap.

WWE Network Subscriber Base and Status of PPV Streaming Deal

WWE announced that as of April 6th, the WWE Network had an overall subscriber base of around 2.10 million with around 476,000 being from free subscribers. This was up by around 98,000 for total subscribers and around 243,000 for free subscribers compared to last year’s post-WrestleMania 35 subscriber base. In terms of revenues, the Network saw a 7.8% decline in revenues compared to the same fiscal quarter last year.

During the Q&A session, Vince McMahon stated that the company is currently planning on adding a new paid tier to the WWE Network during this year’s fiscal fourth quarter. McMahon also stated that the reason for the lack of a pay-per-view streaming deal was due to coronavirus issues causing talks with major interested streaming providers to fall apart. McMahon stated that major streaming providers are currently not interested in adding a new major expense during these unknown financial times.

Saudi Arabia Events Status

McMahon stated during the Q&A session that the company is currently uncertain if a second Saudi event will be held this year due to the on-going global coronavirus pandemic.

“They want to run another huge event. We usually have two. They have the same constraints. We are not too sure we’ll get the okay to perform in November or December. They want us to.”

McMahon also stated that if the company is unable to hold a second event this year, their deal with the Saudi Arabian government allows them to tack on any missed events at the end of the contract and this will not cause the company to lose any money from their deal.

Status of Television Tapings

In regards to the current status of WWE television tapings, McMahon stated during the Q&A session that the company had several contingency plans in place in case the Florida state government no longer allowed them to tape shows at their Performance Center.

McMahon also stated that both NBC Universal and FOX had told the company they fully understood their taping situation and had no issues with them having to run taped shows instead of live ones.

“Our partners are not doing as well as they would like to,” he said. “As far as content they totally get it’s not our fault (taping with no fans and the lower numbers). It’s not anyone’s fault. They believe in what we’re doing. We’ve live sometimes, on tape sometimes. We have a good relationship with both partners and they have our backs, as we do there’s.”

WWE 2K21 Cancelled

WWE also announced that this year’s WWE 2K21 video game has been officially cancelled.

2K Games later confirmed that this was the case and more details regarding the future of the franchise will be announced on April 27th.

We will be sharing details on the future of the WWE 2K franchise as well as some exciting news on Monday at 7:00 a.m. PT.

— #WWE2K20 (@WWEgames) April 24, 2020

Transcript h/t: Wrestling Observer Newsletter