Report: Midlife Crisis At Viacom

This season, according to Nielsen ratings have declined by double digits at Viacom’s most popular cable networks, including Comedy Central, BET, VH1, Nickelodeon, Spike, and TV Land. At MTV, the company’s flagship network, prime-time ratings are down 21.7 percent from last season and 25 percent in the 18- to 34-year-old demographic the network targets.

Bloomberg Business reports Viacom’s poor ratings have managed to stand out, even as the collective pay-TV industry suffers an unprecedented ratings slump. In May, according to data compiled by MoffettNathanson Research, overall cable-TV ratings among 18- to 49-year-old prime-time viewers dropped 7 percent from last year. At Viacom, ratings fell 19 percent.

While Viacom is still profitable—last year it earned $2.4 billion in net income on $13.8 billion of revenue—the ratings collapse is alarming because the company is one of the least diversified of the U.S. media conglomerates.

In February the company’s prospects worsened when Jon Stewart, the star of Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, announced he would soon be leaving the network. Stephen Colbert has also jumped ship.

In early April, Viacom announced it would write off $785 million in the second quarter, in part to cover the cost of older shows that are no longer as valuable. Across the company, large numbers of employees have been dismissed. During an April earnings call, Viacom said its domestic ad revenue had fallen 5 percent in the previous three months, the third straight quarterly decline.