By The other day in its quarterly earnings report, Warner Bros. Discovery announced a goodwill impairment charge of $9.1 billion for the second quarter of the year over declines tied mostly to its traditional cable networks and TV operations.
Today, Paramount Global has done basically the same – albeit for a smaller goodwill impairment charge of $5.98 billion. The company, which owns CBS, Paramount Pictures and cable networks such as Comedy Central, Nickelodeon and MTV, said overall revenue in the period fell 11%.
Those declines are tied to its film and traditional TV operations. They come just as Paramount’s streaming business has turned a profit for the first time with ad sales at Pluto and Paramount+ rising 16%.
Though linear and cable networks have seen audiences fleeing in droves to streaming for years, it is finally hitting the kind of numbers that are seriously impacting the economics of the media industry sector.
Paramount indicates it lost nearly $5.32 billion during the quarter, up from $250 million the year prior. The company is reportedly ready to cut $500 million in costs soon, and has confirmed today plans to cut its U.S.-based workforce by about 15%.
It also comes as Skydance Media is expected to take over Paramount and sees a chance to cut $2 billion from the company over time. If no better offer emerges before August 21st, it’s expected the agreement announced last month will move forward.
Source: Variety
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