- Early ratings for Premier League soccer are on the upswing ahead of what's likely to be an expensive auction of new rights for the UK.
- Sky (SKYAY +2.1%) is seeing 8% Y/Y gains, to 819,000 viewers per match, according to Enders Analysis. BT Group (LON:BT) (BT +0.9%) is up 9%, to 692,000 per match. The numbers are a healthy rebound from last year, which started poorly and ended up down 10%.
- That's good news for the league as it gets ready to press more competition for its rights with hopeful new entrants in Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) (FB +0.2%) and Amazon.com (AMZN +0.7%).
- Soccer is key for Sky, which has rights to most games in the league, and it and BT were under investor scrutiny for paying heavily for the rights (which so far seems to be paying off).
- Earlier this month, Facebook said it was interested in live rights but hadn't yet committed to bidding on Premier League matches.
- Now read: Is This 12% REIT A Once-A-Lifetime Opportunity?
Original article