TV Ratings: Fox News Channel Surging

Fox Corp CEO Lachlan Murdoch last week raved to analysts that the company’s affiliate business units are pretty much on a tear at the moment. And why shouldn’t he? A full live schedule at Fox Sports is finally back. Advertising revenue just topped $1.1 billion. And Fox News, according to the company’s chief executive, is reaching market share levels that are “now at multi-year highs” — to say nothing of the recent launch of the Fox Weather app, which Murdoch said has seen more than 1 million downloads post-launch, with users also spending more than 42 million minutes engaging with the free, ad-supported product during its first week.

Forbes reports Murdoch declared, “the fiscal year is off to an excellent start.”

Lachlan Murdoch

From there, the impression Murdoch tried to leave with analysts is that cable news is Fox’s world, and everyone else is just living in it. All of that came, by the way, amid a presentation of the company’s numbers for the three months that ended September 30 — a period in which Fox Corp reported total quarterly revenue of $3.05 billion, up 12% from the same period in 2020.

Advertising revenue during that period climbed 17% to surpass $1.1 billion, mostly due to continued growth at Fox-owned Tubi as well as the return of a full schedule of live events at Fox Sports and more scripted programming at Fox Entertainment in the current year quarter. Quarterly net income, meanwhile, saw an unfavorable comparison to last year ($708 million, compared to $1.12 billion in 2020) due to a $462 million one-time gain that had been recognized from a cash reimbursement that Disney paid Fox.

By way of detailing some of the news-related components of Fox’s operation at the moment, Murdoch teased a little of what’s ahead for TMZ — which Fox bought during the quarter from WarnerMedia for an undisclosed price (although media reports have pegged the deal at coming in under $50 million).

Murdoch said the acquisition gives Fox “an array of possibilities” to quickly expand a brand that’s long been a cornerstone of the company’s local TV stations. The plan, for now, is to bring the TMZ brand to all parts of Fox’s portfolio, he continued, as well as “amplifying TMZ’s digital presence.”

Something else worth a mention is getting to be an old story at this point. But Fox News’ ratings leadership has managed to produce some notable headlines in recent days, including November 2 representing Fox News’ highest-rated “odd year” election night coverage in history.

‘The Five’ is October’s most-watched cable news show as Fox News crushes MSNBC, CNNhttps://t.co/mHL7M2HhNg

— Fox News (@FoxNews) November 2, 2021

The ratings dominance has extended into the late-night hours, with the already-popular Fox host Greg Gutfeld’s late-night show Gutfeld! that launched in April routinely drawing more viewers than the more-established late-night hosts like Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel and even CBS’ Stephen Colbert.