Earnings call transcript: Paramount Global Q1 2025 exceeds earnings expectations

Paramount Global (PARA) reported better-than-expected earnings for the first quarter of 2025, with earnings per share (EPS) of $0.29, surpassing the forecast of $0.27. The company also exceeded revenue expectations, reporting $7.19 billion against a forecast of $7.12 billion. Following the earnings announcement, Paramount Global’s stock price experienced a modest increase of 0.95% in regular trading and remained stable in after-hours trading, closing at $11.68. According to InvestingPro analysis, the stock appears undervalued based on its Fair Value calculation, suggesting potential upside for investors. InvestingPro subscribers can access detailed valuation metrics and 12+ expert insights about PARA.

Key Takeaways

• Paramount Global’s Q1 2025 EPS of $0.29 beat expectations.
• Revenue reached $7.19 billion, exceeding forecasts.
• Paramount+ grew to 79 million subscribers, a 11% year-over-year increase.
• Stock price rose 0.95% following the earnings release.
• The company anticipates domestic profitability for Paramount+ in 2025.

Company Performance

Paramount Global demonstrated solid performance in the first quarter of 2025, driven by a strong increase in direct-to-consumer (D2C) revenue and subscription growth. The company reported a 9% year-over-year growth in D2C revenue, reaching $2 billion. Paramount+ continues to expand its subscriber base, now boasting 79 million global subscribers, a significant 11% increase from the previous year. The company’s TV Media segment also contributed positively, with an OIBDA of $922 million. InvestingPro data shows the company has maintained dividend payments for 20 consecutive years, demonstrating long-term financial stability despite recent streaming investments.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: $7.19 billion, up from the forecasted $7.12 billion.
• EPS: $0.29, compared to the expected $0.27.
• Adjusted OIBDA: $688 million.
• Free cash flow: $123 million.
• D2C OIBDA improved by $177 million, reducing losses to $109 million.

Earnings vs. Forecast

Paramount Global’s EPS of $0.29 outpaced the forecast of $0.27, marking a positive surprise of approximately 7.4%. This earnings beat is consistent with the company’s recent trend of surpassing market expectations. Revenue also exceeded forecasts, coming in at $7.19 billion against a predicted $7.12 billion, highlighting the company’s ability to drive growth amidst challenging market conditions.

Market Reaction

Following the earnings announcement, Paramount Global’s stock price saw a slight uptick of 0.95% during regular trading hours, closing at $11.57. In after-hours trading, the stock remained stable at $11.68. This price movement reflects investor optimism in response to the company’s robust performance and positive outlook. The stock is currently trading closer to its 52-week high of $13.4, indicating a strong recovery from its low of $9.54. InvestingPro analysis reveals a FAIR overall Financial Health Score of 2.24, with particularly strong ratings in Price Momentum and Relative Value. Get access to the comprehensive Pro Research Report, available for PARA and 1,400+ other top US stocks, for detailed insights into the company’s valuation and growth potential.

Outlook & Guidance

Looking ahead, Paramount Global remains focused on achieving domestic profitability for Paramount+ by 2025. The company continues to emphasize cost efficiencies and strategic content investments. Despite potential macroeconomic uncertainties, management is optimistic about the future, with plans to close a pending Skydance transaction in the first half of 2025. While the company wasn’t profitable over the last twelve months, InvestingPro analysts predict profitability this year, with an EPS forecast of $1.44 for FY2025.

Executive Commentary

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, stated, "We’re off to a good start for 2025," reflecting confidence in the company’s strategic direction. Brian Robbins, Co-CEO, highlighted content licensing as a growth area, saying, "Content licensing is a growth business for us." Robbins also emphasized the value of Paramount Global’s intellectual property, stating, "We believe in using our most valuable IP to grow our owned and operated assets."

Risks and Challenges

• Digital advertising faces supply pressures, which could impact revenue growth.
• Continued decline in pay TV subscribers may affect traditional media revenues.
• Macroeconomic uncertainties could influence advertising budgets and spending.
• The company must navigate competitive pressures from streaming giants like Netflix.
• Managing production costs while maintaining high-quality content is crucial.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the challenges in digital advertising supply and the potential for content licensing and bundling. Management addressed the dynamics of linear TV subscriber decline and emphasized the importance of strategic partnerships, such as the relationship with Taylor Sheridan and 101 Studios.

Full transcript - Paramount Global Class B (PARA) Q1 2025:

Nadia, Conference Operator: Good afternoon. My name is Nadia, and I’ll be the conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Paramount Global’s Q1 twenty twenty five Earnings Conference Call.

At this time, all lines have been muted to prevent any background noise. After the speakers’ remarks, there will be a question and answer session. You. At this time, I would now like to turn the call over to Jamie Morris, Panmac Global’s EVP, Investor Relations. You may now begin your conference call.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to join us for our first quarter twenty twenty five earnings call. Joining me for today’s discussion are Paramount’s co CEOs, Brian Robbins, Chris McCarthy and George Cheeks and our CFO, Navin Chopra. Please note that in addition to our earnings release, we have trending schedules containing supplemental information available on our website. Before we start, I want to remind you that certain statements made on this call are forward looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties.

These risks and uncertainties are discussed in more detail in our filings with the SEC. Some of today’s financial remarks will focus on adjusted results. Reconciliations of these non GAAP financial measures can be found in our earnings release or in our trending schedules, which contain supplemental information and in each case can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website. Now I will turn the call over to Chris.

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Thanks, Jamie, and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us on our Q1 twenty twenty five earnings call. I’m Chris McCarthy, and I’m joined here by my fellow co CEOs, George Cheeks and Brian Robbins. I’ll start by saying we are very pleased with our performance in the quarter. Our focused execution with high performing content drove strong results across the company.

Total company revenue grew 2% year over year, excluding the Super Bowl. D2C OIBDA improved nearly $180,000,000 year over year, and we generated $123,000,000 of free cash flow. We’re off to a good start for 2025. And important to note, we have not seen a meaningful impact due to the dynamic macro environment. That said, looking forward, given the uncertainty, we are prioritizing key investments while taking incremental steps to streamline non content expenses.

Now let’s get into some of the highlights of Q1. Starting with D2C, where we continue to focus on driving profitable growth. Paramount plus ended the quarter with 79,000,000 global subscribers, up 11 year over year, including 1,500,000 new subscribers in the quarter. Global watch time per user increased, up 17% year over year, and churn improved 130 basis points year over year. Taken together, Paramount plus revenue increased 16% year over year.

Now, this success was driven by our differentiated content strategy of fewer, bigger breakthrough original series where we continue to see great momentum. In The US, Paramount Plus again had the second most top 10 SVOD originals for the quarter. That includes Landman and nineteen twenty three, which were our number one and number two starts and engagement driver respectively. Looking across both Q4 and Q1 combined, Paramount plus had 25% of the top 10 SVOD originals, second only to the market leader and two and a half times greater than the next closest competitor. On the premium tier in The US, Dexter Original Sin was the most streamed Showtime series ever, and that was followed by Yellowjackets, which was the second most streamed Showtime series ever.

Now turning to international, all of these series are delivering strong results, combined with South Park and Yellowstone where we have these series exclusively. South Park continues to be a top starts driver and a top engagement driver. And starting this July, the series will be coming to Paramount plus in The US. Now turning to Yellowstone, the series remains the number one star driver and the number one engagement driver for us internationally. And the momentum will continue as we expand the franchise with three new series, starting with the Dutton Ranch, which will premiere globally in Q4.

That’s followed by the franchise’s first procedural, The Marshals, premiering on CBS and Next Day on Paramount plus globally starting in Q1 of twenty twenty six. And later next year, the anthology series will continue with the next chapter, nineteen forty four. Looking ahead, we have a great slate of returning hits and big new originals. Our new series, Mobland, premiered at the end of Q1, becoming Paramount plus biggest global series launch ever. And today, Criminal Minds Evolution returned.

Next week, Showtime series, The Shy, premieres on the premium tier in The US. Now, the second half of the year, we’ll see more originals to maximize the impact of increased viewership. Starting in July with South Park, followed by Dexter Resurrection, Showtime’s biggest franchise, returns with star Michael C. Hall, and in August sees the first ever NCIS streaming extension with Tony and Ziva, followed by Taylor Sheridan’s powerful slate of originals starting with Tulsa King in September, then Mayor Kingstown in October. Last year’s smash hit, Landman, returns in November, plus the all new Yellowstone franchise extensions, The Dutton Ranch.

Now turning to Pluto TV, the service delivered its highest consumption ever, with global viewing time up 26% year over year. Now monetization has been softer than expected due to the influx of supply. We anticipate supply demand dynamics will stabilize over time and the continued increases in engagement on Paramount plus and Pluto will lead to improved monetization over time. Turning to D2C profitability, we’ve made great progress driven by subscriber growth, ARPU expansion and churn reduction combined with a disciplined approach to managing investment. And as a result, we continue to expect Paramount plus domestic profitability for 2025.

And now I’ll turn

George Cheeks, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: it over to George. Thanks, Chris. For TV media, we continue to leverage our content investments in sports, news, and entertainment across linear and streaming, with a focus on increasing cost efficiencies. On the revenue side, since early last year, we’ve renewed key affiliate deals that secure revenue and support streaming growth. This approach has contributed to the combination of affiliate and D2C subscription revenue returning to growth on a total company basis in Q1.

In advertising, we’re leveraging our content portfolio with live sports being more valuable than ever. In Q1, TV media advertising, excluding the Super Bowl, was flat year over year, powered by the NFL playoffs and March Madness. We recently kicked off our upfront dinners. We’re once again highlighting the strength of our mass appeal programming, paired with Paramount’s unique set of broadcast, cable, theatrical and streaming platforms across free and pay. Clients consistently remind us that in challenging markets, there are few partners that provide the reach, brand safety and impact of the Paramount portfolio.

CBS continues to deliver audiences at scale across sports and entertainment. The NCAA championship game averaged 18,000,000 viewers, capping the most watched Final Four weekends since 2017. The Masters Sunday broadcast scored nearly 13,000,000 viewers, the largest final round of golf on any network in seven years. And CBS will win a record setting seventeenth consecutive season as the most watched broadcast network with eight of the top 10 shows. CBS’s network audience grew 3% in the quarter compared to last year with the Super Bowl and was up 12% without the sports comp.

At the same time, streaming of CBS primetime shows on Paramount plus increased by 35%. Another example of multiplatform strength, according to Nielsen competitive data for all broadcast and streaming shows, since October, CBS has six of the top 20 slots, second only to Netflix, with Tracker and Matlock ranking number four and number five, respectively. This pipeline is poised to continue. Yesterday, we announced CBS’s primetime schedule for the twenty five-twenty six season. The new shows will include franchise expansions for FBI, Fire Country, and Blue Bloods.

And as Chris pointed out, CBS will premiere the first broadcast procedural drama from the Yellowstone universe. And as always, we remain laser focused on efficiency with all investments, monetizing current and library programming across our platforms and through licensing. Ryan? Thanks, George. In films entertainment, we are continuing our focus on delivering a slate with widespread audience appeal and one that balances investment across titles and drives downstream revenue.

The performance of the segment in Q1 was strong, thanks to the major theatrical success of Sonic the Hedgehog three, delivering box office sales of nearly $500,000,000 a franchise best, which continued to excel in both home entertainment and streaming. Sonic three was a top acquisition driver on Paramount plus following its mid February release and ranks as a top five movie on the service. Not only did our growing fan base come to the service for Sonic three, but we also saw a nice lift for Sonic two and the Knuckles series on Paramount plus Another huge win for us was the streaming performance of Gladiator two, which became the number one movie in Paramount plus history. And speaking of powerhouse franchises, Mission Impossible, The Final Reckoning promises to be a global event with its premiere on May 23. Mission continues to be instrumental in lifting the value of Paramount IP, permeating almost every line of business across the organization since the film franchise’s inception nearly thirty years ago.

Holistically, we’ve built our slate this year to balance the scope and scale of a film like Mission Impossible with other titles that span genres and budget levels, which better positions the studio for profitability. This includes Edgar Wright’s The Running Man, a reboot of the comedy The Naked Gun starring Liam Neeson, and our family animation titles Smurfs and the SpongeBob movie Search for SquarePants. With the goal of driving profitability, we successfully reduced average production costs on Paramount Pictures films by 35% over the last twenty four months. All of this momentum across every aspect of our business is underpinned by our world class entertainment offerings across all of our verticals. We have much to be excited about as we continue to advance the business.

Every day, our teams remain focused on execution, delivering hit series, blockbuster films, and live sports to audiences around the world, and we’re seeing that pay off. We also remain on track to close our pending transaction with Skydance in the first half of this year. Now, let me turn it over to Naveen to provide more details on the financials. Naveen?

Navin Chopra, CFO, Paramount Global: Thank you, Brian. Good afternoon, everyone. In Q1, Paramount generated total company revenue of $7,200,000,000 and adjusted OIBDA of $688,000,000 Adjusted OIBDA reflects year over year improvements in D2C and filmed entertainment, while results at TV Media were heavily impacted by the comparison to last year’s Super Bowl. Free cash flow was $123,000,000 including $108,000,000 in payments for restructuring and other initiatives. Now let’s turn to our operating segment results, starting with Direct to Consumer.

In Q1, D2C continued to deliver healthy top line growth, up 9% year over year to $2,000,000,000 Subscription revenue grew 16%, driven by Paramount plus but was somewhat offset by a 9% decline in D2C advertising revenue, which includes an 800 basis point headwind from the comparison to last year’s Super Bowl. Excluding this comparison, D2C advertising was down 1%, largely due to increased supply in digital video. This disproportionately affected Pluto TV, which has the greatest exposure to the indirect marketplace. Despite the advertising headwinds, D2C OIBDA improved by $177,000,000 to a loss of $109,000,000 through a combination of healthy subscription revenue growth and continued expense management. Turning to TV Media.

Q1 revenue and OIBDA trends reflect the comparison to CBS’s broadcast of the Super Bowl last year. TV Media advertising revenue, excluding the Super Bowl, was flat year over year, and we saw improvement compared to the underlying trends in Q4. Linear advertising in the quarter benefited from continued strength in sports, including strong demand for the NFL playoffs and the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Affiliate revenue declined 8.6% in the quarter, principally as a result of subscriber declines as well as the impact of recent renewals. TV media OIBDA was $922,000,000 in the quarter.

Expenses declined 4% year over year, primarily driven by the comparison to the Super Bowl. We remain highly focused on delivering incremental cost efficiencies and maximizing earnings in our TV Media business. In Filmed Entertainment, we generated revenue of $627,000,000 up 4% year over year, and OIBDA of $20,000,000 which compares to a loss of $3,000,000 in the year ago quarter. Our Q1 results primarily benefited from the success of Sonic the Hedgehog three, which was released late in Q4. Now let me provide some color on Q2, starting with linear advertising, where sports demand continues to be robust.

Although consistent with prior years, Q2 results will reflect a lower volume of sports versus Q1. In Digital Advertising, we expect trends in Q2 to look similar to the underlying trends in Q1. At Paramount plus we continue to expect healthy revenue growth, driven by an acceleration in ARPU, consistent with our plan to achieve domestic P plus profitability this year. Additionally, the combination of our traditional and streaming businesses will again yield net growth in total company affiliate and subscription revenue, a key indicator of our ongoing transition to streaming. Q2 subscribers will decline given the combination of content seasonality and the termination of an international hard bundle partnership.

In film, we expect strong revenue contribution from the release of The Final Reckoning. However, given the timing of marketing spend for the film, we anticipate that the segment will generate an OIBDA loss for the quarter. In terms of free cash flow, we expect Q2 to look similar to last year, including cash restructuring payments of approximately $100,000,000 Looking further ahead, our priorities for the full year have not changed. We continue to expect to deliver Paramount plus domestic profitability for 2025. We are also working toward the full year OIBDA and free cash flow outlook we provided on our Q4 call.

Though growing macroeconomic uncertainty, particularly in advertising, has the potential to impact our results later in the year. In the meantime, we continue to proactively manage spend while prioritizing investment in key growth initiatives. Coming into 2025, we have continued driving D2C growth and significant improvements to profitability, leveraging the powerful reach of broadcast while capturing cost efficiencies, and maximizing the value of our deep library and iconic IP. Although we are operating in a dynamic macro environment, the progress we’ve made on our strategic priorities, combined with focused execution and some of the industry’s most compelling and enduring content, positions Paramount Global for the long term. With that, operator, please open the line for questions.

Nadia, Conference Operator: Thank Our first question goes to Steven Carhal of Wells Fargo. Steven, please go ahead.

Steven Carhal, Analyst, Wells Fargo: Thank you. Just first on advertising, interesting comment you made on Pluto and digital advertising and some of the pressure there. I think, Chris, you said that you expect that that pricing pressure might abate over time. So I’m just wondering if you’re seeing that yet. Is it firming up?

There’s a lot of new digital inventory coming to market from a variety of platforms. So just wanted to see if that’s a trend you have line of sight on yet. And then separately, maybe for George, so the FCC has been pretty vocal about some things it wants to do with affiliates and talking about reverse comp. I want to ask you to comment specifically on what the FCC may plan to do but as you look at the reverse compensation contribution to your affiliate revenue, I think it’s a little more than $1,000,000,000 Is that something that you think could have some pressure over time? Or do you

Navin Chopra, CFO, Paramount Global: think this is just a lot

Steven Carhal, Analyst, Wells Fargo: of noise and you’ll be able to work around this and hold that line relatively flat? Thank you.

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Hey, Steve. Thanks for your question. This is Chris. I’ll take the first part of that and then pass over to George to take the second piece of that. Listen, we’re definitely pleased with our performance for the quarter.

From the total ad sales perspective, broadcast really was significant. CBS Sports and the stable hits really helped us to make up for some softness in the digital space. Now, as you know, last year there were some new entrants that came into the digital supply space, which is impacting the volume of supply. Now, we do definitely expect that that is going to balance out as supplydemand dynamics will balance out. We’ve yet to see that at this moment, but we’re confident that that’s going to happen.

Now more importantly though, Steve, we are very pleased with the engagement that we continue to drive at both Paramount plus and Pluto. At the end of the day, this is a hits driven business and our hit volume and hit content continues to drive more and more engagement. And over time, we are definitely confident that that will, turn into increased monetization.

George Cheeks, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Great. Hi. It’s George. So look, Steve, the relationship between CBS and our affiliate partners is really a mutually beneficial one. We provide valuable content and our affiliates provide scale distribution.

We’re investing heavily in must have live sports and the most watched primetime entertainment schedule. Now if this dynamic were to change, it would be difficult for us to continue to foot that bill. And in that case, the affiliates and local viewers, they would be harmed. So we have a strong record of securing partnerships with all our station groups, including renewing 60 CBS affiliates over the past year alone. So I think that will continue.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Thanks, Steve. Operator, next question.

Nadia, Conference Operator: The next question goes to Robert Fishman of MoffettNathanson. Robert, please go ahead.

Robert Fishman, Analyst, MoffettNathanson: Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Can you help us think about the right balance in licensing your library and some of these new original content to third party streamers versus keeping the content exclusively for Paramount plus Just curious if an arms dealer licensing strategy is still able to command the strong economics that it once did. And then maybe if I can shift over to sports, given the success of sports driving, strong viewership that you talked about on CBS, just interested in your current thoughts on bidding for more sports rights like ESPN’s MLB package or the UFC package that’s in the marketplace now. How do you differentiate between must have and nice to have?

Thank you.

George Cheeks, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Hey, Robert. This is Brian. I’ll take the licensing piece. You know, content licensing is a growth business for us, in particular, our secondary licensing business. Our content is valuable and it drives demand for us.

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: That

George Cheeks, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: said, we believe in using our most valuable IP to grow our owned and operated assets. That doesn’t mean we’re not going to continue to license that product as well, maybe on a co exclusive basis, or after it premieres on one of our owned and operated stations. But we believe that’s the best path for our content. Great. Thanks, Robert.

On the sports side, look, I believe we have a very robust sports portfolio. We’ve got core franchises. We feel very good about it, but we’re always going to be open and opportunistic. We’ll continue to take a disciplined approach, and our goal will always be to ensure that we have the optimal sports portfolio. We’re always looking for sports rights that really matter and that really drive audience and scale.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Thanks, Robert. Operator, next question.

Nadia, Conference Operator: The next question goes to Ben Swinburne of Morgan Stanley. Ben, please go ahead.

Ben Swinburne, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: Thanks. I guess this is probably for Naveen, but obviously interested in what everyone’s take on it is. Naveen, you mentioned you expect another quarter of net subscription revenue growth in Q2, streaming growing fast enough to offset the linear declines. As you take a longer term view, can you talk a little bit about the expectations you have for linear declines and streaming growth, kind of the drivers behind those things. I’d be curious if you think what we’re seeing in linear this year is unusual based on some of the renewals you had last year or if this is sort of normal trend and how you think about the drivers of D2C subscription revenue growth kind of longer term from the scale that you’ve achieved today with Paramount plus Thank you.

Navin Chopra, CFO, Paramount Global: Yeah. Hey, Ben. Thanks for the question. On the linear side of the business, the two major drivers there are the rate of call it pay TV subscriber decline in the ecosystem more broadly and then the nature of the deals that we negotiate. Certainly the primary factor that is driving the revenue trend is the subscriber decline.

And I think that will likely continue to be the case. There has been some impact from deal renewals in the last couple of quarters. But if I look at the trends, for instance, in Q1, I don’t expect major changes over the next few quarters there. So the net of what you’re seeing in terms of sub declines and deal renewals, I think, in Q1 is indicative of, what we’ll see over the next few quarters. On the streaming side, the growth drivers there are very clear.

It is continued subscriber growth. It is improvements in churn and ARPU, which ultimately drive revenue growth. And given that it’s largely a fixed cost business, the more we can scale that revenue, we see significant improvements in profitability similar to what you’ve seen over the course of both 2024 and continuing to move forward in 2025.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Thanks, Ben. Operator, next question.

Nadia, Conference Operator: The next question goes to Richard Greenfield of LightShed. Richard, please go ahead.

Richard Greenfield, Analyst, LightShed: Thanks for taking the question. Chris, I was watching your interview or read your interview the other day about Teler Shard. And I think the amount of times that you mentioned Teler Sheridan between you and George earlier. It’s obvious how important Taylor Sheridan is to Paramount’s current and future. I’m curious why you haven’t thought to acquire one hundred one Studios to be fully vertically integrated with Taylor.

One hundred one has been reportedly been for sale on and off for several years. I mean, I guess another way of asking the same question is like, why is the current state of your relationship with Taylor Sheridan the optimal model for maximizing value for Paramount?

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Hey, Rich, thanks for your question and thanks for reading the article. Listen, we absolutely value both of those parties. Let me first start though by saying that they’re two separate entities, Taylor and one hundred one. Now Taylor is a very gifted and unique creative, and Paramount has an exclusive with him through 2028, and we own all the IP that comes out of that. We have a great relationship with him, deep partnership that we built over time and it’s working.

The results really speak for themselves and we’re confident that that partnership and the hits will continue. Now as it relates to, 01/2001, they’re absolutely preferred partner. We love working with them and David and what he and his team have built, and so much so that we’ve invested in them. But we do like the relationship we have. We think the incentives are based on where they should be.

So, plan to keep the current process and the current relationship as it is. Now, related to Taylor, he really helped us to learn some new models. He’s a unique creative and we built a model that was uniquely around him as opposed to forcing him through our structure. Now we’ve since used that as a playbook, to bring in new creatives. Jez Butterworth is one of the most recent ones where we’ve seen great success with him, with the agency, and most recently with Mobland.

Mobland, as we talked about, was the biggest global premier that we’ve had on Paramount plus to date. So listen, we love the relationship with Taylor. We’re welcoming new creatives, and, we definitely will continue to use one on one as a preferred partner. But, we like the relationships we have today.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Thanks, Rich. Operator, next question.

Nadia, Conference Operator: The next question goes to Rick Prektis of Raymond James. Rick, please go ahead.

Robert Fishman, Analyst, MoffettNathanson: Thanks. Good afternoon. Obviously, a lot of, industry attention on streaming, potential for bundling joint ventures, maybe m and a, domestic international. Maybe if you can just walk through the different types of combinations and the pros and cons of how you think about your desire or interest in participating in some of those versus a do nothing.

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Hey, Rick. How are doing? This is Chris again. Happy to take that question. Listen, we’re very happy with the success that we’ve had to date.

You know, we only launched just a few years ago, and we’re already up to nearly 80,000,000 global subs. Revenue this quarter up 16%. So real momentum. We’re seeing great engagement growth, really good solid improvement in churn. And listen, all of that is driven by our hits.

We have a powerful combination between the CBS primetime slate, sports and our originals on streaming where we really are in a class of our own. So we feel great about the momentum. We’re just on the cusp of, Paramount plus domestic profitability, so we feel really good. Now listen, that said, we’re always gonna take an opportunistic look at, different opportunities, whether that’s bundling, whether that’s doing something maybe more deeper with a partner, certainly nothing to announce today. But I can say that we are big fans of bundles.

In fact, we were some of the early movers. It’s important that when we look at bundles, we do that at a very incremental audience point of view. So particularly when they’re hardest to secure. So you take something like what we did with Walmart, which has been and continues to be a great partnership for us, or whether we bundle with, hard bundle internationally with some great partners to get some distribution. We’ll continue to look at all types of bundles, but really going to take an opportunistic look at that, at really what’s going to drive the most value and what’s going to accelerate our plans.

Jamie Morris, EVP, Investor Relations, Paramount Global: Thanks, Rick. Operator, we’ll do one last question.

Nadia, Conference Operator: Thank you. The final question goes to Kat Gunnarala of Evercore ISI. Kat Gunnarala, please go ahead.

Kat Gunnarala, Analyst, Evercore ISI: The TV media were well ahead of expectations and above the core trends you saw last quarter. Maybe you could talk about what drove the upside there in the quarter? And maybe looking to Q2, I appreciate that sports ad inventory is sequentially lighter. But separate to that, can you help us think about any current linear trends, especially as you head into the upfronts? And Naveen, I just want to make sure in terms of the guidance for the full year on OIBDA and free cash flow, I just want to make sure that I didn’t miss it that you’re effectively reiterating the prior guidance.

Thank you.

Chris McCarthy, Co-CEO, Paramount Global: Hey, Kokan, I’ll take the first half of that question and then I’ll pass it over to Naveen for the second half. Listen, we’re absolutely pleased with the performance that we had this quarter as it relates to revenue and certainly the strength of CBS and the broadcast slate, seventeenth straight year in a row, we’re the number one, and sports was really a big driver. Now that helped us to make up for some softness in the digital landscape, and as Naveen talked about, we still have good solid sports in Q2, although a little lighter. So we continue to expect those trends to look very similar. And in terms of how things are looking in the upfront, listen, we feel really good about the conversations and discussions that we’ve been having.

I will note that scatter in this quarter is up double digits, which has always been a really interesting early indicator for us for the upfronts. So we’re feeling really good. Now listen, macro is certainly on people’s mind, but everyone is giving us great feedback. We continue to hear good things, particularly around the unique set of assets and the volume of hits and really strong sports portfolio. So we feel pretty good.

Naveen?

Navin Chopra, CFO, Paramount Global: Yes. Thanks, Chris. So with respect to our comments on, full year guidance, I think it’s important to remember a few things. Number one, the fundamental drivers of earnings improvement that was built into our 2025 plan remain in place. That includes significant improvements in B2C profitability that take advantage of the improvements in churn, in ARPU and sub revenue growth that we highlighted.

It includes the ongoing non content expense reductions that we’re making across the company. And it includes finding ways to get more leverage from those content investments across all the dimensions of our business, linear, streaming, licensing, theatrical, and you heard a number of examples of that from the CEOs today. All that said, the macro environment is uniquely dynamic right now and that does create some uncertainty, which has the potential to impact revenue primarily in advertising. At the same time, we are pushing the pedal harder on expense reductions. But I think it’s premature to try to quantify the impact of that on earnings and cash flow until we have more clarity on how all the macro stuff will unfold.

So with that, I just want to thank everyone on behalf of the co CEOs for joining us today. We are proud of the progress we’re making to drive value as we deliver high performing content and continue to advance the business. We also want to thank our teams and our partners for their continued contributions. Have a great evening, everyone.

Nadia, Conference Operator: Thank you. This now concludes today’s call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.

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