CBS Chair & CEO Les Moonves said that the company's CBS Sports HQ streaming service "saw spikes in users around major events" in Q2, including the NBA Draft, Triple Crown races and FIFA World Cup, according to Chmielewski & Hayes of DEADLINE.com. Moonves during a Q2 earnings call also discussed legalized sports betting as a possible "new source of ad revenue." Moonves: "When FanDuel and DraftKings were at their height, they were spending a fortune in advertising. We think it’s a category that has an unbelievable upside" (DEADLINE.com, 8/2). Moonves said that it is "likely that sports betting would start as a local phenomenon." BROADCASTING & CABLE's Jon Lafayette notes with sports bets being accepted in New Jersey, CBS will "see revenue at its Philadelphia station first, then New York." Moonves "did not provide a figure for how much revenue advertising for sports betting could generate." Moonves: "As long as sports (betting) remains local, obviously it will be better to surround it with sports programming and we have such a ton of that between the network and our cable network as well as HQ. ... We’re not that far down the line in terms [of] shoulder programming or sports betting, but we’re looking forward to it" (BROADCASTINGCABLE.com, 8/3).
AVOIDING THE TOUGH QUESTIONS: The WALL STREET JOURNAL's Flint & Hagey note at the start of the earnings call, a CBS official "issued an edict" that the company's investigation into allegations of sexual harassment against Moonves "would be off limits for questioning." On Twitter, reporters and "other observers mocked what they said was the cowardice of the analysts for failing to ask about the scandal" (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 8/3).
