CBS President & CEO Les Moonves yesterday during the company's Q3 earnings call reiterated that "only a small number of opportunities remain for would-be Super Bowl advertisers," according to Anthony Crupi of AD AGE. Moonves: "With just a few units left to sell, you can imagine what these last few slots will go for." He added that CBS "has been able to secure the record prices it set when it began moving in-game spots back in the summer." Moonves three months ago "pegged CBS's going rate for a 30-second sliver of real estate in the Feb. 7 broadcast" at $5M a pop. Buyers who have placed clients in the game said that units "are fetching anywhere between" $4.6M and "a little north of" $5M. But Moonves also said that quarterly results in the near future "should be much stronger," with "an additional AFC playoff game" this season among the factors (ADAGE.com, 11/3).
TEAM STREAM: The WALL STREET JOURNAL's Stynes & Flint note CBS' Q3 revenue fell 3.3%, which the company "blamed on the timing of television licensing sales and decreases in pay-per-view revenue." CBS said that the decline in overall quarterly revenue, from $3.37B a year earlier to $3.26B now, also included the "impact from the nonrenewal" of U.S. Open tennis rights and one fewer NFL telecast in Q3. Advertising on the net was up 1% for the quarter and excluding the year-ago quarter’s additional NFL game and U.S. Open programming, network advertising increased by 8%. Cable revenue, which includes Showtime, CBS Sports Network and Smithsonian Networks, fell 16% to $526M (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 11/4). CBS said that it "expects advertising spending for the Super Bowl and political campaigns will bolster revenue" for '16. REUTERS' Toonkel & Maan noted the company is "trying to rely less on advertising revenue," which accounted for about 45% of its total revenue in the latest quarter, but fell 4.3%. Instead, CBS is "focusing more on its online subscription streaming services such as CBS All Access" (REUTERS, 11/3).
