TNT Sports Fuels WBD’s Surge As Max Hits 110.5M Subscribers

TNT Sports parent company Warner Bros. Discovery saw its stock price rise early Thursday after reporting its best quarter of streaming growth since the launch of Max in May 2023.

The total number of Max subscribers grew by 7.2 million to 110.5 million globally by the end of September. Specific U.S. subscriber numbers were not reported.

As NBC does with Peacock and Disney does with ESPN+, more TNT Sports game broadcasts have been simulcasting on Max in the U.S. Eventually, WBD plans to charge $9.99 per month for the B/R Sports on Max tier, but so far it has made all of its content free: NBA, NHL, MLB, March Madness, and more.

On Thursday’s earnings call, WBD CEO David Zaslav touted a recent partnership that made Max free to Charter’s Spectrum TV customers and a separate bundle that brings Max together with Disney+ and Hulu. He didn’t address Venu Sports, the stalled joint sports streaming venture with Disney and Fox, but did call for more consolidation.

“Consumers put on a TV set and they see 16 apps,” Zaslav said. “And each of those are doing different pricing and you’re seeing it with your phone and Googling where a show is or where a sport is and you’re going from one to another and there’s so many that you have. … It’s not sustainable. And there probably should have been more meaningful consolidation … and you’re starting to see it now.”

Outside the U.S., WBD has some global-media rights for the Olympics, and it said the 2024 Paris Games generated more than 215 million cumulative views across WBD platforms, a 23% increase from the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

During Q3, WBD still felt the negative impact of selling off its AT&T SportsNet regional sports channels last year. That exit hurt the growth rate of the company’s networks segment by roughly 2%, with revenue there still growing to just more than $5 billion. 

In December, TNT Sports will add two College Football Playoff broadcasts, and then in 2025 NASCAR (races, practices, and qualifying) and the French Open to its U.S. portfolio, which will lose the NBA after this season.

After taking a huge initial stock hit following its previous Q2 earnings report in August, WBD was trending up Thursday, reaching a high point of $9.78 per share midway through the morning, following a closing price of $8.38 on Wednesday.