Variety: Nexstar Ad Sales Down 9%, CW Owner Beats on Q2 Earnings

Story from Variety:

Nexstar reported its second-quarter 2025 earnings Thursday, revealing ad sales dropped 9% year over year for the April 1-June 30 period without a presidential election to fuel political ad spend. Meanwhile, the TV station group giant is still projecting its CW broadcaster will reach profitability by next year.

For Q2, Nexstar reported $475 million in overall ad revenue, down 9% from the $522 million posted in the comparable 2024 quarter. That included a $36 million decrease in political ad spend, down to $9 million for the quarter, and an $11 million drop in non-political ad sales.

During a call with analysts later Thursday, Nexstar COO Mike Biard said that in Q2, Nexstar’s broadcast network the CW saw its “profitability improved by $21 million year over year, driven by reduced amortization of broadcast rights and lower operating expenses following our Q4 restructuring,” adding that “year-to-date, The CW has improved profitability by $5 million.”

Per Biard, “Our outlook for the year remains unchanged, and we continue to project improved profitability of about 25% in 2025 over 2024, with continued expectation of achieving profitability sometime in 2026.”

Nexstar’s distribution revenue stood at $733 million for Q2, a very slight 0.1% dip from $734 million the prior year.

Wall Street forecast earnings per share (EPS) of $2.67 on $1.21 billion in overall revenue, according to analyst consensus data provided by LSEG. Nexstar reported diluted EPS of $3.06 on $1.23 billion in revenue.

“Second quarter 2025 marked another solid quarter of financial results for Nexstar,” Nexstar CEO and chairman Perry Sook said in a letter to shareholders. “As expected, our year-over-year results were primarily impacted by lower non-election year political advertising revenue, offset, in part, by strong expense management. Our operational milestones during the quarter highlight the success of our network growth strategies both at The CW and NewsNation. According to Nielsen, in the first half of 2025, The CW ascended to the #8-ranked network overall, reflecting five consecutive quarters of primetime ratings growth and the success of our strategic pivot to sports programming which now accounts for over 40% of The CW’s programming hours. At NewsNation, shortly after celebrating its one-year anniversary as a 24/7 cable news network, Nielsen ranked NewsNation as the fastest growing network overall year-over-year. Looking ahead, we remain optimistic about the prospect for regulatory reform, completing our upcoming distribution renewals, and capitalizing on the 2026 mid-term election political advertising opportunity.”