Peacock Finally Turns a Profit as Comcast’s Margins Slip

Peacock generated $189 million in adjusted EBITDA in the second quarter of 2026, its first profitable quarter since launching in 2020, a swing of $290 million from the $101 million loss it posted a year earlier. The streamer added 2 million subscribers to reach 48 million, lifted by the FIFA World Cup, the NBA playoffs and Love Island USA.

That milestone came inside a Comcast earnings report where the rest of the numbers were considerably messier. Theme park profit fell, the broadband business kept shedding customers, and company-wide adjusted EBITDA actually declined on a comparable basis even as revenue grew. Moody’s, meanwhile, already has Comcast’s credit ratings under review over the same corporate split that Peacock’s turnaround is meant to help sell to Wall Street.

Six Years, $11 Billion, and One Profitable Quarter

Peacock has never made money in a single quarter since its 2020 debut. By the end of the first quarter of 2026, its cumulative losses had climbed past $11 billion, including a $432 million loss in the first three months of this year alone. Full-year losses peaked at roughly $2.7 billion in 2023 before narrowing to about $1 billion in 2025.

Three things converged to finally flip the number positive.

• FIFA World Cup – Telemundo’s Spanish-language rights alone generated $440 million in incremental quarterly revenue, and the Spain-Argentina final drew 23.9 million viewers across Telemundo and Peacock, the most-watched Spanish-language World Cup broadcast on record.
• NBA Playoffs – alongside the World Cup, the postseason helped push domestic advertising revenue in the Media segment up 55% to $2.16 billion.
• Love Island USA – the reality dating show rounded out an entertainment slate strong enough to carry Peacock’s subscriber base past the 48 million mark.

Comcast’s own securities filings show the improvement was already underway before this quarter. Peacock’s adjusted EBITDA losses improved by nearly $700 million across all of 2025 as revenue rose 10% to $5.4 billion and paid subscribers grew 22% to 44 million. Q2 2026 is the payoff of a multi-year trend, not a random one-quarter fluke, which is exactly why executives are wary of reading too much into it going forward. Comcast executives cautioned that Peacock profitability will vary quarter by quarter based on sports scheduling, and recommended judging the streamer year over year rather than quarter to quarter.

Revenue Grew Three Times Faster Than Profit

Zoom out to the segment that actually contains Peacock, and the picture gets more complicated. Comcast’s Content & Experiences group, which bundles Media, Studios and Theme Parks, posted revenue of $10.7 billion, up 22.9% from a year earlier. Adjusted EBITDA for that same group rose just 7.1%, to $1.3 billion.

The gap is starkest inside Media, the segment that houses NBC, Telemundo and Peacock together. Media revenue jumped 25% to $5.7 billion, but adjusted EBITDA rose only 3.7%, to $708 million, what the company itself described as mid-single-digit growth. The cost of live sports rights, the same World Cup and NBA inventory that pulled in viewers and ad dollars, ate up most of the incremental revenue before it reached the profit line.

Studios had a genuinely strong quarter behind it, with revenue up 25% to $3 billion and adjusted EBITDA of $202 million, powered by the Super Mario Galaxy Movie and the horror hit Obsession, which took in more than $400 million at the box office. Co-CEO Mike Cavanagh also flagged a film that will not show up until the third quarter. He told analysts Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey “became one of the defining theatrical events of the year, reinforcing the power of our creative partnerships and ambitious storytelling, with The Odyssey becoming Nolan’s biggest global opening of all time.”

Theme Parks Lose Their Footing

A year ago, theme parks were Comcast’s cleanest growth story. Epic Universe opened in Orlando in May 2025, and the segment generated $3.1 billion in adjusted EBITDA for all of 2025, according to Comcast’s own annual proxy filing. This quarter, that momentum reversed.

Theme park revenue rose 2.7% to $2.4 billion, helped by domestic attendance at Epic Universe, but international parks pulled the other way. Adjusted EBITDA fell 5.1% to $609 million as operating expenses outran the revenue gain.

Brian Roberts, Comcast’s chairman and co-CEO, and Cavanagh addressed the softness directly in a joint statement. “While we are seeing some near-term softness in Theme Parks, we remain confident in the long-term opportunity, supported by our world-class brands, attractive locations and proven ability to create attractions and experiences that drive real consumer demand,” they said.

Cavanagh went further on the earnings call, pointing to conditions outside the company’s control. “We believe there are some temporary factors at work, including higher fuel prices and weaker consumer sentiment,” he said. “But we are watching these trends closely.”

Moody’s Is Not Buying the Investment-Grade Pitch

Three weeks before this earnings call, on June 29, Comcast announced its plan to spin off NBCUniversal and Sky into a standalone public company, separate from its broadband and cable business. Moody’s response came almost immediately: the ratings agency placed Comcast’s credit ratings under review for a possible downgrade.

Comcast’s reduced revenue diversification following the planned public spin-off of NBCUniversal and Sky assets concentrates the remaining entity’s exposure to intensifying competition in broadband end markets.

Neil Mack, a vice president in Moody’s corporate finance group, wrote that in a statement explaining the review. He added that the credit resilience of cable broadband business models remains under pressure because of debt leverage running into conflict with negative operating trends in lower-growth markets.

That review sits awkwardly next to what Cavanagh told analysts on Thursday’s call. “Our intention is to set both companies up with strong investment-grade profiles and the financial strength and flexibility to pursue their respective growth strategies,” he said. Comcast’s own numbers this quarter, a shrinking pro forma EBITDA margin and a broadband unit still losing customers, are the exact dynamics Moody’s flagged as a risk to that goal.

Versant’s First Six Months Are Not Encouraging

This is not Comcast’s first attempt at this kind of separation. It spun off Versant Media Group, home to CNBC, USA Network, Syfy and Golf Channel, on January 2, 2026, distributing one Versant share for every 25 Comcast shares. Versant fell more than 13% on its first day of regular trading and closed at $40.57, well below its $45.17 opening print.

The stock did not recover quickly. By late January, Versant’s shares had posted a 30-day return of negative 27.8% and a year-to-date return of negative 28%. Versant also guided investors to expect FY2026 revenue to decline 3% to 7% and adjusted EBITDA to decline 7% to 14%, citing weak linear pay-TV demand and softer post-election news audiences.

That does not guarantee the same fate for a much larger NBCUniversal and Sky spinoff built around Peacock, Universal Studios and Telemundo rather than aging cable channels. But it is the only real precedent Wall Street has for how it treats a Comcast breakup, and the first data point was rough.

What Happens to Peacock When Comcast Splits in Two?

Peacock stays inside the new NBCUniversal and Sky company once the separation closes, run by Cavanagh as sole CEO, while Xfinity broadband and wireless become a leaner, separately traded Comcast under Michael Angelakis, the company’s former chief financial officer. Comcast expects the split to close in about a year, pending regulatory approval, board sign-off, tax opinions and financing arrangements.

Comcast is already acting on the caution the numbers suggest. The company paused its share repurchase program on June 29 as it works through the separation, even after returning $2.1 billion to shareholders through dividends and buybacks in the second quarter alone. Sky, the European business folding into the new entertainment company, moved in the opposite direction, striking a £1.6 billion ($2.1 billion) deal to acquire ITV’s television network operations shortly after the spinoff was announced, a sign the future standalone company is already building scale on its own terms.

Roberts described internal reaction to the split as uniformly warm. “We’ve talked with our key constituencies, employees at every level, and most of our key partners, and the reaction has been overwhelmingly positive,” he told analysts. “I feel more positive and energized today than I was on the day we announced it.” Cavanagh was similarly bullish on the assets he will inherit. “This is an extremely valuable collection of assets at NBC,” he said, adding, “I do believe that NBCUniversal and Sky do have the heft and the relationships and the operational capabilities to continue to be a major player as an independent.”

What We Know:

• Leadership – Cavanagh becomes sole CEO of NBCUniversal and Sky; Angelakis becomes CEO of the remaining Comcast connectivity company and serves as a strategic advisor until the split closes.
• Timeline – the tax-free separation is expected to close in about one year, following the same structure used for the Versant spinoff.

What Is Unconfirmed:

• Debt allocation – how Comcast’s 40.2% adjusted EBITDA margin in residential connectivity and its overall debt load will be split between the two new companies.
• Moody’s timeline – whether the ratings review concludes before the separation closes, or drags into the new companies’ first quarters as standalone filers.

Comcast still expects the whole thing to close in about a year. Moody’s is not waiting that long to start asking questions.