{"id":434181,"date":"2025-12-08T22:07:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T22:07:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/434181\/"},"modified":"2025-12-08T22:07:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-08T22:07:14","slug":"the-cw-will-turn-a-profit-at-some-point-in-2026-nexstars-cfo-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/434181\/","title":{"rendered":"The CW Will Turn A Profit “At Some Point” In 2026, Nexstar’s CFO Says"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe CW<\/a> will finally turn a profit sometime in 2026, parent company Nexstar<\/a>\u2018s CFO, Lee Ann Gliha, said Monday.<\/p>\n

\n\tEchoing sentiment from Nexstar execs team in recent months, Gliha said the former 50-50 venture between the owners of CBS and Warner Bros. has found its footing even if it is breaking even later than initially expected. In 2022, Nexstar took a 75% stake in the broadcast network, with Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery each retaining 12.5% stakes.<\/p>\n

\n\tAt the time of the deal, execs projected 2025 as the year of break-even, outlining a top-to-bottom revamp of the network. The company took control of the network for no up-front consideration, and instead by agreeing to take on The CW\u2019s debt. In the intervening years, the hour-long scripted dramas that were longtime staples have been replaced by live sports and unscripted fare. (All American, one of the few holdovers from the previous era, recently got renewed for an eighth and final season<\/a>.) <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe\u2019re getting there,\u201d Gliha said in an appearance Monday at the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference. \u201cWe started with a very, very negative business, and quarter after quarter, year after year have been improving it.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tIn 2025, she said, profitability will increase by 25% over 2024 levels, and in 2026 \u201cwe will achieve profitability at some point during during the year.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tThe corner has been turned by \u201cmore than halving\u201d the network\u2019s programming costs, Gliha said. At the same time, total programming hours have gone up by 40%, with sports now accounting for 40% of the total. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe variable that wasn\u2019t known at the time of the CW transaction was sports rights, with The CW moving aggressively to license LIV Golf, NASCAR, college football and basketball as well as the sports-adjacent WWE NXT. While Nexstar CEO Perry Sook favors the term \u201cMoneyball\u201d when describing the company\u2019s approach to sports rights, the sector has inherent volatility.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe feel very proud of what we\u2019ve done so far\u201d with The CW, Gliha added, and \u201cthe profitability discussion only tells you part of the story.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tCoupling the network with an industry-leading number of CW affiliates is another key strategic goal of the acquisition, the exec noted. <\/p>\n

\n\tOwning The CW enabled Nexstar to \u201cbring back a number of those affiliates onto Nexstar stations, and that\u2019s been very profitable for us,\u201d Gliha said. \u201cSo, when you look at the sort of totality of everything, it\u2019s been a good deal for us.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The CW will finally turn a profit sometime in 2026, parent company Nexstar\u2018s CFO, Lee Ann Gliha, said…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":434182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[201258,171,96194,33451,173,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-434181","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-broadcast-networks","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-nexstar","11":"tag-the-cw","12":"tag-tv","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}