WWE Releases First Quarter Financial Report, Vince McMahon Comments on Wrestlers' Absences

WWE released its earning report for the first quarter of 2019 on Thursday, giving investors a closer look at home the company is performing from the start of the year up through WrestleMania 35.

The company's revenue for the quarter was posted at $182.4 million, which is down from $187.7 million for the same quarter in 2018. Vince McMahon commented in the press release by saying that the decrease in revenue was caused by various wrestlers being absent from television.

"While engagement metrics over the past two quarters were impacted by Superstar absences, we believe they will improve as our talent return and we launch our new season following a successful WrestleMania," McMahon said. "We remain excited about the future, particularly with our debut on Fox in October."

Other highlights from the report, which you can read in its entirety here, included the WWE's subscribers total increasing by two percent to 1.58 million and digital video, social media and hours consumed all increasing by double-digit margins. The report stated that the WWE Network's subscriber count reach two million on the day of WrestleMania 35, and that 17.9 million hours of wrestling product was consumed during the WrestleMania week.

"In the quarter, we delivered Adjusted OIBDA within the range of our public guidance and continue to target full-year record revenue of approximately $1 billion and record Adjusted OIBDA of at least $200 million," WWE co-president George Barrios said in the press release. "Our primary focus is to deliver record results while investing in our key priorities: content creation, localization and digitization."

On the creative side, WWE spent the last two weeks of television reshuffling its television rosters. The two-night Superstar Shake-up last week saw 28 wrestlers between Raw, SmackDown, NXT and 205 Live all move to different brands. But several more changes were added on this week, with United States Champion Samoa Joe and Cesaro moving to Raw while Andrade, Zelina Vega, Aleister Black, Jinder Mahal and the Singh Brothers all headed to SmackDown.

As of Thursday six matches have been announced for the upcoming Money in the Bank pay-per-view on May 19. Along with the two titular ladder matches, the show will see Becky Lynch defend both of her women's championships in matches against Lacey Evans and Charlotte Flair, WWE Champion Kofi Kingston vs. Kevin Owens and Universal Champion Seth Rollins vs. AJ Styles.

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