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Analyst: Pay TV Will Lose 8.1% of Customers in 2024 and 2025 as Cord Cutting Becomes More Prevalent

Analyst: Pay TV Will Lose 8.1% of Customers in 2024 and 2025 as Cord Cutting Becomes More Prevalent

David Satin
David Satin has been a dedicated News Writer at The Streamable since 2022, covering a wide range of stories in the entertainment and streaming industries. With years of experience writing online, David previously worked as a list writer for Screen Rant, where he gained recognition for his extensive coverage of sci-fi and fantasy genres. His ability to break and analyze major stories has made him a trusted voice in the streaming world. Over the course of his career, Satin has become an integral part of The Streamable team, contributing to some of the most impactful stories in the industry.
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David Satin
•
Known for breaking major streaming stories, he’s covered everything from Netflix policy shifts to Peacock’s ad-tier changes. A sci-fi fan and Toshiba Fire TV user, he brings sharp analysis and a love for the genre to his reporting.
Known for breaking major streaming stories, he’s covered everything from Netflix policy shifts to Peacock’s ad-tier changes. A sci-fi fan and Toshiba Fire TV user, he brings sharp analysis and a love for the genre to his reporting.

It’s streaming’s world now, and cable is just living in it. That’s according to Wells Fargo analyst Steven Cahall, who has been tracking the progress of cord-cutting amongst cable and satellite providers, as reported by Next TV. Cahall’s latest forecast has continuing bad news for pay-TV companies, showing that cord-cutting is much more than just a trend.

Cahall’s estimates portend that pay TV will lose 8.1% of its remaining customers in both 2024 and 2025. If those figures are accurate, it will mean cord-cutting is accelerating; pay TV lost 6.2% of its users in 2022, and 7% of its customer base in the second quarter of 2023. Overall, pay-TV penetration now sits at 76.9 million homes, down from its peak of over 100 million in 2015.

Predictably, local affiliate owners like Nexstar and Sinclair Broadcasting Group stand to lose the most from cord-cutting. Both of those companies see more than 50% of their revenues come from domestic affiliates, and Fox is not far behind; 49% of its revenues come from domestic affiliates, making it the most exposed of the major networks.

That could explain why Nexstar is reportedly asking for twice as much in the way of retransmission fees from DIRECTV as it received in its last carriage deal with that provider. With so many users leaving the pay-TV ecosystem, Nexstar has to start collecting more from the viewers it still has.

This is not a problem unique to Nexstar and Sinclair; all of the top cable providers lost viewers in the second quarter of 2023, adding up to 1.73 million losses across the industry. Virtual multichannel video programming distributors (vMVPDs, also known as live TV streaming services) also lost users during the quarter, and only YouTube TV managed to add subscribers.

Streaming hit a new record high of total TV viewing time in July 2023, and cable and broadcast combined fell under 50% of all TV watched for the first time. Analysts like Cahall make it clear that cable’s days are numbered, and the number is shrinking precipitously with every calendar year that passes.

David Satin
David Satin has been a dedicated News Writer at The Streamable since 2022, covering a wide range of stories in the entertainment and streaming industries. With years of experience writing online, David previously worked as a list writer for Screen Rant, where he gained recognition for his extensive coverage of sci-fi and fantasy genres. His ability to break and analyze major stories has made him a trusted voice in the streaming world. Over the course of his career, Satin has become an integral part of The Streamable team, contributing to some of the most impactful stories in the industry.
Read full bio ›
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