Sports Programming Costs Rising, S&P Says

Most pay-TV subscribers get 100-plus channels in their video bundles, up from 27 in 1995, with sports-related networks today accounting for about 17 of those, S&P Global Market Intelligence said Friday. It said sports channels were the most expensive of genres, averaging $1.11 per subscriber per month, with costs from $7.46 per sub per month for ESPN to 5-7 cents for Outside TV and Outdoor Channel. It said the NFL Network was the only other national sports network commanding in excess of $1 monthly a sub in 2018. It said sports programming costs as a portion cable average revenue per user was roughly 22.1 percent in 2018, up from 14.1 percent in 2009. S&P said the local sports rights market has seen numerous new entrants, like ESPN Plus, YouTube and FloSports, but their effect on values of local sports rights in the next few years "will be minimal." For regional sports networks, monthly license fees per sub averaged $2.64 in 2018, up 8 percent from 2017 and up 37 percent from 2014, it said.