Sphere Entertainment Revenues Dip In Q1; Dolan Pushes Mini-Sphere Plan

Sphere Entertainment, the corporate parent of the eponymous Vegas venue and the MSG family of television networks, reported first quarter revenues of $280.6 million, down 13% against the same period last year.

Much of that loss can be attributed to the MSG Networks segment, as the company’s agreement with cable provider Altice expired during Dec. 31 before being renewed in February. The two-month blackout cost MSG Networks nearly $30 million and resulted in a 19% revenue hit for the TV segment of Sphere Entertainment.

As for Sphere itself, revenues were down 8% to $157.5 million. That’s despite a $25.6 million increase in event revenues — shows by Dead & Co. and Eagles increased concert count by 10 over the same period last year. The Sphere Experiences sector — a repertory series of films, including Darren Aronovsky’s “Postcard from Earth” and now a concert film of U2’s debut residency at the $2.3 billion venue — has been the most reliable source of revenue for Sphere since it opened. A lower show count — 200 against 257 in Q1 2024 — resulted in a revenue dip there.

Advertising revenue from Exosphere also took a hit, thought Q1 2025 is not a fair comparison to Q1 2024 when Las Vegas hosted the Super Bowl.

On the bottom line, the operating loss nearly doubled to $78.6 million against a loss of $40.4 million last year, again with most of the hit taken by MSG Network. The network segment did post a profit of $15.2 million, but that’s off 65% from last year. The Sphere segment’s loss grew 12% to $93.8 million.

On an earnings call, Sphere CEO James Dolan urged investors to be patient and look long term.

“When you all look at this business and when you invest in it, it is not the venue business,” Dolan said. “We built this business on a disruptive model that utilizes the venue 365 days a year and even has multiple events during the day. With the Eagles and with the Dead, we’re running two original content shows on the same day as the concert, which makes for a very profitable day.”

To that end, Dolan intimated the future of Sphere may not be in full-size versions of the venue — the second location is slated for Abu Dhabi — but in the strategic placement of “mini-Spheres” across the U.S. and worldwide.

“We’re definitely talking worldwide about Sphere,” Dolan said. “But we do have another initiative that I think is very important that we are undertaking this year. We’re right in the middle of designing a smaller Sphere deployable in markets inside and out of the U.S. The strategy there is to build faster, cheaper, and have an ROI that makes investors enthusiastic. I expect by the end of the year, I expect we’ll be talking about that smaller Sphere product as another way of expanding the business, as well as continuing to build [full-size] Spheres like in Abu Dhabi and other markets.”

In the short-term, Dolan says there’s still plenty of enthusiasm on the artist side about playing the venue, which will host its first country act in Kenny Chesney later this year, along with a residency by the Backstreet Boys and the Eagles’ fall return.

Shares of Sphere were volatile in early trading, but were up about 3% to $30.68 by midday.