Spanish Pay-TV Subscribers Drop to Under 4 million
Madrid, Spain, July 24, 2013 — Pay-TV subscribers in Spain have dropped for the fifth straight quarter in the first three months of this year. Data published by the regulator Telecommunications Market Commission (CMT) indicated that pay-TV platforms only had 3,926,844 customers as of the end of March, compared to 4,077,101 three months earlier, and 4,369,849 as of March 31, 2012. The latest figures are pay-TV platforms’ lowest since third quarter of 2009.
Canal+ was the leading provider of services with 1,691,281 subscribers, though its take-up was also down, for the fourth quarter in a row. Second placed Ono also noted yet another quarter of contraction, ending March with 853,750 pay-TV subscribers. Telefónica, GolTV and TeleCable were next up with 656,499, 260,098 and 132,852 subscribers respectively.
Pay-TV revenues, however, continue to hold up, with the total figure for first quarter amounting to US$583.07 million (€440.98 million), or slightly down from the US$587.26 million (€444.15 million) posted three months earlier, but higher than the US$573.08 million (€433.43 million) revenues in first quarter 2012.
Advertising incomes between January and March dropped 15 percent and pay-TV companies invoiced US$473.51 million (€358 million).
Sogecable's platform dropped 4.5 percent and currently has 1.7 million customers, but it has increased income by 19.5 percent to US$396.77 million (€300 million). The new policies of the company, which is fighting against a huge debt, seem to be working and adding value to the cable platform, reports say.
The CMT report reveals that TV ad revenues in the commercial TV dropped by 16.3 percent to US$585.16 million (€442.5 million) in the second quarter with public TV channels taking the worst hit with a fall of 27.25 percent to US$50.79 million (€38.41 million). But private TV operators also suffered from a 15.1 percent fall in revenues to US$534.38 million (€404.09 million).
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