TVB sees growth in advertising income thanks to return of blue-chip clients

Local broadcaster TVB has seen positive momentum in the advertising income of its terrestrial free-to-air channels during the last quarter of 2023. It is also expecting a smaller EBITDA loss for the financial year ending 31 December 2023 compared with a year ago.

According to the official announcement on HKEX, the average unit rates during the period for TVB's Jade channel prime time TV advertising spots softened 5% compared to the three-month period ended 30 September 2023, but was still 18% higher than the three-month period ended 31 December 2022 as the broadcaster continued to see more blue-chip advertising clients return to the platform during the quarter.

Furthermore, during its 2024 “early bird” pre-commitment campaign held in December 2023, TVB secured double-digit growth in advance bookings from clients for the 2024 TV advertising packages than it did last year during the 2023 pre-commitment campaign.

Given that such precommitments typically account for a significant portion of its total advertising billings for a given year, the results of its 2024 “early bird” campaign are a positive indicator for its advertising income in this coming year.

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On the other hand, the group’s over-the-top (OTT) streaming business continued to show positive momentum during the quarter, with premium myTV Gold subscribers growing 1% and 21% respectively compared to the three-month periods ended 30 September 2023 and 31 December 2022 while average monthly active users (MAU) across all service tiers held steady at approximately two million.

Meanwhile, digital advertising on its myTV Super platform saw strong growth, rising 73% and 95% during the quarter, compared to the three-month periods ended 30 September 2023 and 31 December 2022 respectively. As such, TVB expects to achieve growth of over 30% in digital advertising revenue over the full year of 2023.

In terms of its mainland-China-related business, TVB’s multi-channel network (MCN) business and partnership with Taobao and Douyin livestream stores recorded approximately 181m social media followers and 87m livestream audiences as of December 2023.

In general, TVB expects to achieve positive EBITDA for the six-month period ended 31 December 2023, compared to the EBITDA loss of HK$186m incurred in the first half of 2023.

On a full-year basis, TVB also expects to make a smaller EBITDA loss for the financial year ended 31 December 2023, compared to the EBITDA loss of HK$338m incurred in the financial year ended a year ago.

MARKETING-INTERACTIVE has reached out to TVB for more information.

Don't miss: TVB to cut 300 jobs, reduce number of free channels to 4

Back in November last year, TVB laid off over 300 staff and restructured its TV broadcasting and eCommerce businesses, by merging two channels and two eCommerce platforms. According to an official statement by TVB, it said the company would create a new channel named “TVB+” by combining the content of its current J2 and Finance, Sports & Information (FSI) channels. 

TVB also recorded a HK$807m loss attributable to equity holders of the company for 2022 due to a weakened TV advertising market and a slowdown in the company's China co-production business caused by COVID restrictions across the border. Meanwhile, its revenue increased by 24% mainly due to the expansion of the eCommerce revenue of its subsidiary platform Ztore.

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