Okay. Welcome, everyone. We're here with our second fireside chat of the day. I'm thrilled to introduce John Nallen, who's the Chief Operating Officer of Fox. John, welcome.
Thanks, Brian. Thanks for having us.
Maybe just to start off, kind of a high-level question. Despite this being an off-cycle political year, Fox has continued to exhibit very strong results year to date. I'll remind people, Fox is on a fiscal year, so we're actually more than halfway through the year now. Revenue's been up versus last year. EBITDA is down a little, but still dramatically up from 2024. Perhaps maybe you could just start off by talking about some of the highlights of the last 12 months that have driven the strong fundamentals, and what are the key areas of focus in the back half of fiscal 2026 and as you head into fiscal 2027?
A lot to unpack there. But let me go high level, and maybe we'll use it to dig down into some of the areas as we talk about. If I look back for the last 12 months briefly, it's been a very strong period for Fox. Fox News has had incredible rating gains during that period. FOX Sports has had record-breaking revenues led by the NFL, college football, baseball. We launched FOX One, which was a big initiative by us. Fox Entertainment has launched three big shows that are new to the network that are really promising. I guess Tubi, which I'm sure we'll talk about, has had great engagement and revenue gains during that period. The backdrop for that last 12 months has been a very, for us, a very healthy advertising market-
Some constructive trends on subscribers. If I look forward from a business perspective, we've got, you know, a dynamic news cycle which attracts big audiences to Fox News. We've got the World Cup on Fox coming up this summer, which will be very, very exciting for us and a great platform for our advertisers. The continuance of the growth in Tubi and their growth in KPIs and contribution to EBITDA will be a theme as we look forward. Of course, the growth in Fox One is something that we're looking forward to in the next few years to reach the kind of levels we've talked about in the past. I think the theme for us is that we've got confidence in the momentum that we've got right now.
There's, you know, there's not really anything on the horizon that is a big speed bump for us as we look forward. I think to wrap that up in a balance sheet and cash flow generation, that's been super, right? I mean, our balance sheet is an asset of the company. We use it judiciously. We're focused on capital allocation, and really disciplined about it. I think if you look both backward and forward, this point about confidence in the momentum is really what we're focused on.
Okay. All right. We're gonna dig into several of those areas you mentioned. It was a good way to start off. On the affiliate side of the business, you know, the rate of subscriber decline across your networks has continued to gradually improve. I think it was 6.3% decline in the December quarter, and that's without the contribution of FOX One. What are the factors that you think are driving this improvement, and where do you see that trend going from here?
As I said, the trends in subs are pretty constructive lately, and we've had seven quarters in a row of improved trends around subscribers. Underscoring that, to your point, it's without the inclusion of FOX One, which makes those trends even better. We're holding off including FOX One in the trend line until we get through an annual cycle with FOX One to really understand the dynamics around that.
Right.
It's not. It's interesting. What's not driving it is, some of the real innovations that are coming in, the paid TV world. For example, skinny bundles, are not, have not really hit the market yet. Only recently, as YouTube announced theirs. DIRECTV has put a couple out there. Charter obviously has a smaller, package. We haven't seen a dramatic improvement in the trend coming from skinny bundles, which is a positive.
Our expectation is those kind of innovations are going to contribute even more toward the trend line in subscriptions. All in all, it's a good sign. Look, we're still in a decline.
Right.
Not forget that. Luckily, here at Fox, we've been able to outpace that decline with the pricing power of the channels that we have.
Second derivatives. Those are positive second derivatives.
Right.
You've successfully renewed 25% of your affiliate base in fiscal 2025. And you're in the process of renewing, I think, another 25% in this year, in fiscal 2026. How are you positioned for the larger cycle in fiscal 2027 and 2028, where I think you said you'll be breaking new ground with the new vintage of deals? How do you expect pricing power to evolve in this landscape, particularly as those skinny bundles you mentioned proliferate?
For us, to your point, we had 25% of our, quote-unquote, book, renewing in the fiscal 2026 that we're in. We're basically done with that, so we don't have any major renewals to finish out our fiscal year for June. Those were quiet. They were successful. There wasn't the kind of noise that some of the other channel providers had across their portfolio. Beginning in 2027, that steps up. We have a higher percentage increase, renewing at that point in time. To your point, it's a fresh vintage. The ones that we've completed up through this year were based on market rates that had been established on other deals. We're now coming into some new territory on rates and packaging around all these renewals that are coming up.
Look, we've got a very focused portfolio. We don't have a big tail of channels like we did, you know, in 2019. I think that helps. I think the investments that we're putting into our product, particularly in the journalism, Fox News, the sports on FOX Sports, the entertainment product, as I referred to earlier, helps us in pricing. In many ways, our pricing, I don't want to say power, but our pricing power is pure in that we're not bringing along underperforming assets in the discussion. Given the strength of our channels, the discussion with the distributors has always been about that these are must-have channels in any.
Yeah.
any portfolio. Whether it's big or skinny, you're gonna need Fox News, FOX Sports, FS1, you know, all the other channels we have. Look, these negotiations are always difficult. The innovation, as I said earlier, that's coming into the market, I think, is a, is a positive trend looking forward.
Sure. As you mentioned, the company has really distinguished itself with live sports and news, and that's really insulated the company from the ratings declines that we've seen, you know, broadly in linear entertainment for the industry. There's still this cord-cutting, obviously dynamic. Beyond specific renewal terms, how do you think about the long-term evolution of Fox's business model in a world where the traditional pay TV subscriber likely continues to shrink? How does your portfolio strategy ensure that you'll be able to thrive and grow over the next, say, five to 10 years?
Your question focuses on the business model, and the heart of Fox's business model is delivering content, primarily news and sports, to highly engaged scaled audiences, and then taking that content and monetizing it through. You know, 50% of our top line is advertising sales, 50% is distribution. It's a simple business and a simple business model. I don't see in the next five to 10 years on the content side, the channel development side, much change. That is, we'll continue to invest heavily in journalism and into sports and into entertainment product to continue to make the Fox channel stand out in a, in a very complex world. I think on the distribution side, there will be evolution.
We've already seen it on our own business with the launch of FOX One as a digital distributor. I know people talk about traditional distributors and digital distributors, and really that is morphing into one. I mean, it's what's YouTube TV? A digital distributor or traditional distributor? You know, what's, you know, Xfinity? Are they digital or are they traditional? Most everything is going to be focused as a digital distributor and unleash the kind of innovation inside that product that you'll see. FOX One will be our biggest near-term evolution in distribution to bring subscribers from the non-pay world into FOX One, and I think that's a vitally important point. Put differently, our top priority is our pay TV universe, our pay TV partners, and we don't take any actions that would look to cannibalize at all the relationship we have with them.
I think the place you'll see evolution over the next five to 10 years is not in the content side, probably not so much in the advertising side, but in the distribution side, I think you'll see the business model changing a bit.
Yeah. Okay. Maybe we can get into news a little bit. Looking back, I think most people would have expected Fox News viewership to decline after the presidential election cycle, but the network has continued to deliver increasing audience and audience share. You've attracted hundreds of new advertisers, national advertisers over the last several quarters to Fox News. Do you think CPMs continue to grow? Based on the success, do you expect to see more advertisers joining the platform? Maybe as part of that, you could also discuss how much of a discount the broadcast TV Fox News is at this point in time, and how much of that gap, you know, could actually be closed.
Fox News has continued to just gain market share in a very heavy news cycle. You take, for example, the State of the Union a couple of weeks ago. We had 9 million viewers that night, which was 70% of the cable news market share. That's just indicative of the strength that Fox News has in that market, and to your point, in competing with broadcast news as well. Right now, we underprice against broadcast about 50%. That's the opportunity on pricing for Fox News to continue to move up in pricing. We've seen that. We've seen high single-digit increases in national rates at Fox News. We've seen DR rates mid-single digits, including... You don't do it overnight. You're not gonna achieve that kind of lift in pricing overnight.
To your point earlier, we've attracted more and more advertisers to Fox News, not only linear, but digital as well. That's because of the scale of their audience. More Democrats, more independents, more Asian Americans, more Hispanic Americans on Fox News than any other channel. It's a safe environment for big blue chip advertisers to come in and to get to an audience that they otherwise wouldn't be getting to. We've had seven quarters in a row of revenue growth at Fox News. I don't, you know, see what would. We've got an election cycle coming up. We've got, again, a big dynamic news cycle going on. The prospects for Fox News continue to be as strong as ever.
Is that 50% discount, I mean, is that average of all broadcasts, or is that broadcast news, or is it broadcast sports?
No, it's pretty well across.
Okay.
across the day part.
Okay.
Against the equal day part.
Okay.
for broadcast.
Okay.
Look, that's our ad sales group knows that's the opportunity that they're to go after, but it's not one that you get overnight. It is that prospect of pricing power, pricing opportunity, I should say, that it is a great outlook for Fox News.
Right. Okay. I think Lachlan mentioned on the last earnings call that you expect a robust political advertising cycle in the midterms this fall, which I don't think is too surprising to anyone. And Fox News is increasingly capturing a larger share, though, of that national political spend, which I think is more recent dynamic. As we head into the 2026 midterm election season, how are you positioning the entire Fox portfolio from the local stations to Fox News, excuse me, and even Tubi to kind of maximize your share of what should be a record-breaking political market?
It will be a record breaker. There's no question as we look out. Estimates I've seen put the market spend across all advertising media at $11 billion and upwards of that, which is a record. There's spending everywhere, but there will be aggressive spending in certain key markets that we're in.
Yeah.
Georgia and Florida here have big gubernatorial and Senate races. California, you well know, has the big gubernatorial race. Michigan's got a trifecta, gubernatorial, Senate, House. Pennsylvania's got really active House seats that's always, you know, competitive and a lot of money always spent in Pennsylvania, whether that be national or local. We're clearly going to benefit at the local station level.
Right.
That $11 billion is across all media, but a heavy concentration will be amongst local station and local digital. The stations are positioned really well for the midterm. Tubi just has to be a beneficiary of that.
Yeah.
They hit a market that you can't get with linear. About 2/3 of their users and audience are cordless, so they're not in the environment that people are spending the linear money to. Tubi had a great national election cycle last time, and from a local standpoint, it just has to be. Campaigns need to use Tubi. The place where we don't get a tremendous amount and very, very little in midterm elections is Fox News because it's a national channel. We get a second derivative benefit because there's a lot of viewing.
Yeah.
that comes out of these races and people understanding what it means to the rest of the country. That ratings lift has a knock-on impact to advertising. We get it in three ways. The principal stations, driven by the stations, then by contribution that Tubi will have really for its first time in a midterm election of size, and then Fox News through ratings.
Do you know what the what the last presidential cycle was? I mean, so this is, let's say, the $11 billion's accurate. Do you remember.
I don't.
I was just wondering how much lift that was represents. Maybe we could just talk about the current ad market for a second. Can you just talk about what you're currently seeing in terms of ad trends across your networks and stations in Tubi? Anything on category performance, you know, which ones are better than others and how is demand broadly, you know, across the market?
As I said in my opening comments, the advertising market for us at Fox is really healthy.
Okay.
That's particularly true on the national side. I'll touch on local as well as we go through it. We've had again, seven quarters in a row by coincidence of advertising growth. From a category standpoint, nine of our top 10 categories are growing, led by finance, pharma, and tech. The only one that's down is entertainment, and that's really just because of theatrical releases in movie schedules.
Right.
when they're going out. The scatter pricing's up. The amount of options that are taken is quite low, from cancellations from advertisers from the upfront. If I look almost division by division, Fox News continues to be strong based on the comments I just mentioned. Particularly strong, what's surprising is the last two quarters on a comp basis because they were comping to heavy political spending a year ago, yet revenue's up in Fox News. That's really talks to the strength of what we're seeing in Fox News. Fox Sports right now, heavy bookings going on with motorsports. That's the season we're in.
Yeah.
A lot of attention and a lot of enthusiasm around the World Cup beginning in June on Fox Entertainment, as I said, we've got three new shows, Memory of a Killer, Best Medicine, Fear Factor, that are doing really well and attracting advertisers to entertainment. Something we really don't talk about much.
Yeah.
Primetime entertainment is relatively small business for us, but they're standing out during this time. Local station's a bit more mixed.
Okay.
The Olympics has sucked a lot of money out of that market and put it into the NBC stations. Right now it's a quieter market in local stations. I expect that to change really dramatically with the advent of the World Cup coming in our Q4 and Q1 upcoming. The last one would be Tubi, where that is a really competitive market. You know, digital AVOD, incredibly competitive market from a price standpoint. Tubi's continued to stand out as what we call premium AVOD during that period and has continued its growth, and I'm sure we'll talk about its KPIs. It hasn't abated at all at the Tubi level.
Despite the really heavy competitive nature of the pricing, the volume and engagement we're getting at Tubi continues to see ad sales growth. Overall, healthy advertising market. I don't see anything on the horizon that's really going to interrupt that. We're getting ready for the upfront already.
Yeah.
You know, you think about when the cycle goes around, and we're going into it very encouraged on our position.
Yeah. Okay, great. Maybe we could talk about FOX One, which you launched about seven months ago just before the NFL and college football season started. Sounds like it's performed well with sub growth, you know, pretty healthy relative to your expectations. Would you provide maybe some additional color on FOX One's performance now that football season's over? What are you seeing in terms of seasonal churn among those customers?
Yeah. Remember what FOX One is. FOX One is a digital platform that really just provides our channels in a really interactive way for users. It is not an SVOD platform. For the most part, what's on it is our linear content. Our subscriber growth has been better than we expected. Really encouraged by it. Importantly, as I mentioned earlier, we see no tangible outcome of it taking subscribers from pay TV. We just haven't in the remits that we get from pay TV and the conversations that we have with our pay TV operators. It's attracting subscribers from the cordless community.
Okay.
We made a quasi promise that we wouldn't go after pay TV subscribers in our marketing, and you have yet to see and won't see advertisements for FOX One on the NFL and college football on Fox Entertainment. They're all digitally sourced, and all the subscribers are digitally sourced. From a viewing standpoint, as you'd expect, during the sports season, particularly the NFL season, heavy concentration of viewing by those users on sports.
Right.
2/3 of the viewing in a week was on sports. As the seasons were ending, both college football and NFL, we started to see more toward the users around our news product just to get them more enticed in the news product. What we've seen now, which you'd say is almost obvious, but has now shifted, where 2/3 of the viewing is news on a highly engaged audience. Churn has been better than what we expected, but I think we're yet to see the full story on it. It just deals with how the monthly subscribers renew.
Yeah.
We're probably a couple of months away from understanding completely what the churn profile is. From an investment standpoint, it, you know, it continues to be, you know, right in line with what we expected. It's not a massive investment. You know, you think about what happened during the streaming launches of other companies.
Yeah.
billions they put into it. That's not the level of investment we've had or will have in Fox One. All in all, we're really encouraged that, you know, the ability of the subscribers to hit the levels we want, we remain encouraged by. Importantly, really importantly, the fact that it's accessing and not cannibalizing pay TV and accessing cordless is an important element for us.
Right. Okay. Great. Maybe you could talk about Tubi a little bit. It turned profitable two quarters ago, which I think is earlier than was articulated, you know, in the outlook by management. What drove that outperformance? As you look forward, what are the key drivers that are gonna drive Tubi to that long-term 20%-25% margin that you've talked about? Related, how do you balance reinvestment into growth with margin expansion at Tubi?
Tubi's numbers have been very good. Last quarter that we reported was a 19% top line growth in revenue and I think it was 27%-28% increase in TVT, which is the underpinning delivery.
Right. Engagement. Yeah.
Yes. It was a contributor, not only a contributor to EBITDA, but the comp contribution from a year ago was dramatic. You'll continue to see that now quarter-on-quarter.
Right.
Because we were investing heavily into Tubi a year ago. From a content standpoint, we continue to invest in what is the biggest library out there. We're also experimenting more and more with original content that we know based on the algorithm will work with the users. For example, we have a host of Gen Z female skewed content on there now, and we introduce it every month. What we find is the median age of that content comes way down, 25 years old, and it's again attracting an audience that you generally can't get on the linear side.
Right.
As far as scaling the business and marching toward the 20%-25% margins, which I still think is exactly where you go, what we're seeing is we don't need on a percentage growth basis to invest as much in content and marketing as the top line is growing. The top line is outpacing the growth of the cost.
Right.
which is exactly what we thought would happen because the library is so big. It's not like as users grow, we need to add more and more and more content on top of the library. The investment there will grow at a more natural rate while top line will grow with engagement. I don't see anything in the way of Tubi hitting those margins in the near term.
Okay. That's really interesting that, you know, you feel like you don't need to add content at this point.
Content dollars.
Content dollars.
Content dollars, I would say.
Okay.
Yeah.
It's almost like the, you know, it's, like an accumulating habit where people are engaging more with it because they like it.
Yeah. Not only they like it, we make them like it. The algorithm is there to just get people. Tubi's always used this phrase, the rabbit hole, to just take them down the rabbit hole to different places, all of a sudden they're locked into Tubi for a long time.
Interesting. Okay. Maybe you could give us a more holistic view of the digital portfolio. How should investors think about the path to profitability for the entire group of digital investments? At what point do you see this collection of assets going from a net investment to maybe a significant source of EBITDA and free cash flow growth for the company?
Let me take that one as basically investment spend that we have.
Okay.
It captures your comments in there because it's just one leg of our capital allocation strategy, organic investment into the business. We said to the market at the beginning of the fiscal year that we expected to invest roughly $350 million of EBITDA into growing initiatives. Quite frankly, they were led by two, FOX One and FOX Latin America, which is principally Mexico is our operation. Those are both doing better than we expected, and we would expect to invest less than the $350 by the end of the fiscal year because of the track that they're on. A year ago, we invested $300 million into EBITDA in fiscal 2025. 90% of that was Tubi.
As you can see, just by demonstrating the investments that we've made over time, that's now flipped to an EBITDA contributor, no longer in the investment cycle. We've got these two other and fewer Fox Nation, FOX Weather, a few others are in-
Right.
are in that bucket as well. We build businesses. You know that historically. You're always going to see some level of organic investment by Fox into a business to grow the business and grow the enterprise.
Yeah.
We haven't used a lot of our capital for external inorganic M&A, we have deployed it internally. You know, our expectation of both of these new initiatives being contributors to EBITDA is in the near term, that they will turn around. Something else we'll sit here a year from now and talk about the new investment we made into X.
Okay.
I'm not sure what X is yet. Oh, no. I don't mean. I should say Y not X. It's just in our DNA to-
Okay.
-to invest into EBITDA. Overall, the investment spend that we targeted, we'll do better than. The businesses that we're investing in are doing better than we expected.
Okay. Okay, great. Maybe we can move to sports. There's obviously a lot of discussion right now in the market about the early reopening of media rights and negotiations with the NFL. How can you reassure investors that there won't be a significant transfer of value from Fox to the NFL in this process, which is a concern that, you know, clearly has been weighing on the stock lately?
You're right. There's been a lot of chatter about the NFL over the last month or so in the market. The one thing I would say at the beginning and I would say the end is we have a fantastic relationship with the NFL. It's 30 years, 31 years in the making. We produce their most complex set of games on Sunday.
We provide an incredible promotional platform for them, not only on Sports Sunday, but in the Fox Entertainment network, on Fox News and increasingly on Tubi and FOX One, and of course, at the local stations. It's an important relationship going both ways. Factually, we have four years left on our contract fixed before this famous opt-out year occurs.
Right.
In 2029. Look, we've been through this before. If there's an early discussion around lengthening significantly lengthening our relationship with the NFL, then we'll wanna understand what that means for Fox and for our shareholders and for our partners. We've done this 5 x, and every time, I think I've sat with you at least once or twice around renewal time, the question is how do you monetize a step-up in rates? The way it's been done historically is the way it'll be done in the future, and that our top line ecosystem participates in this.
I mean, for anyone to think that rights increases begin and end with the media rights holder is just misguided. That's not the way the ecosystem has historically worked and will work.
Sure.
We'll look forward to a discussion if there is to be one around, early renewing or talking about the current deal. Like I said, I'll end with the fact that we've got just a super relationship with the NFL.
Okay. World Cup. The FIFA Men's World Cup is gonna be in the U.S. this summer. Maybe you could talk about your expectations for the event relative to what we've seen in prior years when you've had it, particularly around advertiser demand and just the ability of World Cup to maybe attract new subs to FOX One. Seems like there's an opportunity there as well.
Yeah. It's wholly different now than any other cycle. We're in the U.S. principally, North America. For America 250, you know, it's just a big event.
Yeah.
To remind you, it spans our fourth quarter and fiscal first quarter, June and July. We've got 40 more matches than we've ever had. 70 of the total matches are going to be on broadcast TV on Fox. We'll simulcast a couple of matches on Tubi early on, that's a small piece of the activity. Every indication from a viewer standpoint, and certainly from an advertiser standpoint, is that this is going to be a big event, and there's a lot of momentum going into it. We already see advertisers in market, particularly those that are FIFA partners, advertising the World Cup as part of their. Coca-Cola is a great example, where a lot of their advertising right now is coupled with mentioning of FIFA.
We're getting a lot of promotion from a viewing standpoint through the advertisers who are talking up.
Right
FIFA. I expect. Look, the next two cycles are outside the U.S. This will be a very big cycle. Of course, we knock wood that the U.S. team goes far and long on this whole cycle.
It'll be a repeat of hockey, right?
Yes. That would be nice. That would be wonderful. Great story to tell.
I mean, it sounds like it's gonna be much bigger than any past World Cup. I mean, not only is it here, but you've got the time zone advantage as well. I mean, could it be multiples of prior World Cups or?
I don't wanna guess, but it's going to be big.
Yeah.
There's no question.
Okay.
I mean, there's just been a lot of activity, a lot of discussion around it. There's more interest in the World Cup in America now than I've experienced on prior World Cups that are outside the country.
Yeah. I think 1996 was our last one.
Yeah. That's a while ago.
Yeah. What about Fox One? I mean, you think It'll be a big one for that as well?
Oh, sorry. I should have gone. Yes. Yes, absolutely. If you look at the start of any sports season for us, whether it was college football, pro, even with motorsports that we're having now, we always see a lift coming out of it.
Okay.
There's no question. For two months. You basically have an NFL season over this, these 2 months.
Right.
Our expectation, and we will be promoting heavily toward the World Cup for FOX One, is that we'll see a lift coming right out of that. The benefit, coming out of it too is, or we will be in baseball following the World Cup, and then shortly after that into college football. The ability for us to hold onto those World Cup subscribers and to not have them churn right away is better than, we'll say, the period that we're in right now, where there's a big gap between football and World Cup.
Right.
Hopefully, the churn metrics will be as positive as we're seeing right now.
Yeah. Okay. Great. Maybe we could talk about capital allocation a bit. Fox has been a, you know, I would say, a very prudent allocator of capital ever since the divestment of assets to Disney. Balance sheet, as you mentioned before, remains conservative with significant cash. I think gross debt to EBITDA was under 2 x. You've got really seasonally strong free cash flow ahead in the March and June quarters. What are your plans for capital allocation and cash deployment? Any appetite for M&A? Love to hear your thoughts on that.
I guess, as I said in my opening, it's an asset, a real hallmark of the company going way back, but certainly since the spin in 2019, that we pay attention to our balance sheet and to the uses of our cash flow. Three principal areas of focus that we have is organic investment that I touched on, capital returns to shareholders, and M&A or inorganic investment. The place we've really leaned into since 2019 has been in the capital returns.
There's over $10 billion returned to shareholders in buybacks and in dividends during that period of time. We've got still a healthy ceiling left on our buyback authorization to continue to do that. In fact, we announced in September, I think it was, $1.5 billion ASR, which just last week we completed, and we're in the market buying stock now. Capital returns has been the place we've been focused because we haven't found any M&A asset or enterprise that's been so attractive to us that we'd want to separately lean into that.
Now, my desk is filled with every banker's pitch on every business out there, but none of them has risen to the point, given the discipline we have, where we say, "Okay, that fundamentally will change the business of Fox and extend the business of Fox." We are, I should say, we are about growing the enterprise.
It's not that we wanna just be a buyback machine.
Right.
We wanna deploy our capital to grow the enterprise of Fox. We continue to look out there on the market and be focused on opportunities that are around. Like as I said, we did a small one several years ago in putting probably around $500 million into buying Tubi.
That was really the largest.
Yeah
initiative, acquisition initiative that we had. more recently, we acquired Red Seat Ventures
Right.
Focus on the podcast business, but that wasn't, you know, that didn't rise to the level of, say, a Tubi acquisition. We'll continue to, and we've done that. We've augmented Red Seat, which is primarily focused on podcasts, with more and more acquisitions of podcasters as well as little businesses that are around the podcasting space. Something that's below the radar for most discussions.
Yeah.
-that we have, but clearly it's an area that's got a great amount of growth ahead of it, and we're riding that on a smaller scale going forward.
Yeah. I mean, how bullish are you on that podcast opportunity? I mean, you know, we've seen other company. It's obviously very big, right? It's become a big medium. There's big stars in it, making real money. The advertising dollars have grown a lot. I wouldn't call them big, but they've grown a lot. It seems like enterprises, though, don't really make a lot of money on it, you know. I mean, SiriusXM makes some money on it, and I don't know if Spotify does. Do you think it's, it could be a big moneymaker someday, or is it still to be determined?
It's all a question of scale, right? You need to have a very big stable of clients, podcasters in there to make money.
Okay.
Make sizable money. We are profitable at Red Seat.
Right.
That's what we're focused on. We just did this Audiochuck deal, Crime Junkie, a few others that we're continuing to add to the stable of the Red Seat podcasters. I think in volume, you'll see a sizable contribution. Is it, you know, is it going to be the size of Tubi or FOX One or one of those businesses in the near term? Probably not.
Yeah. Okay. Maybe just lastly, we could talk about your non-consolidated investments in FanDuel and Flutter. How should we think about the value of those, both financially and strategically? I think I know the answer to this, but I'll give you an opportunity to talk about it. Do you think the stock price reflects the full value of those assets? Are you concerned about the prediction market's impact on the sports betting business?
Let me take the last one first, because there's a whole number of ways you can go with the prediction markets. My view is with the prediction markets being nationally licensed, that it actually puts some pressure on the states to open up online sports gambling, the states that haven't. Because the prediction markets can now be.
Right.
-in markets where heretofore they've said, "No, there's no gambling in these markets." For firms like FanDuel, Flutter, DraftKings, MGM, others, I think there's an opportunity that there'll be an expansion of the TAM through markets opening up for them. The converse is, do the states get active against the prediction markets and try. There have been a couple of Nevada and a couple of other places have been.
A lot of money.
Well, that's what it. It works both ways.
Right.
To the extent that you can expand the market, there's more money for the states. To the extent the states can put their hands on the prediction markets, there's more money for the states.
Right.
I don't think there's a threat that the prediction markets are going to unseat the online sports gambling guys. I think they can cohabitate among them. Now, yes, you're right. My answer to your question within the question is we don't fully get the value for our sports betting assets that we deserve. We make that point at every conference and every meeting, so I'll leave it to market pundits to do their work. We've got the investment in Flutter, Topco, and the 18.6% investment in FanDuel. You know, we've got till 2030 to get licensed. We're on track to get that all done. You know, gambling is a great adjacency, wagering, to what we do at FOX Sports.
Yeah.
We are involved with the prediction markets. The both Kalshi and Polymarket have talked to us about how can they interact with sports and news, which are two vital areas for what they do.
Sure.
I don't see the death knell of online sports betting as part of the prediction markets, and I still see great opportunity for the place we're invested in there.
Okay. I agree with you that those assets aren't priced into your stock, for what it's worth, so.
Keep telling the market, will you?
All right. We'll, we'll wrap up there. We're just about out of time. Thanks so much, John.
Thank you.
Thanks, everyone, for joining us.
Appreciate it. Thank you.