WWE is driving the growth of TKO.
In TKO’s first quarter results for this year, overall revenue is $1.597 billion. That’s an increase of $328 million or an increase of 26% year-over-year.
WWE alone brought in $475.7 million. Compared to last quarter that’s an increase of $84.2 million or 22%. WWE’s live events, their media rights and merchandizing are responsible for the growth.
Here’s the breakdown:
Medi Rights: $281.7M. An increase of $30.1M.
Live Events: $123.5M. An increase of $47.2M.
Consumer products: $44.3M. An increase of $6.3M increase.
Sponsorships: $26.2M. An increase of $0.6M.
Live events, especially those outside of North America like the Royal Rumble, are responsible for over half of the WWE’s growth this quarter. If you add the live events and media rights that equals to 90% of WWE’s growth. In comparison, UFC brought in $401.2M this quarter making it TKO’s profit machine but WWE is the company’s growth engine.
TKO is still in the red for $4.671 billion. This quarter that increased $888 million. That debt has been rising not shrinking. In the first quarter of 2025 it was $2.78B. At the end of 2025 it was $3.78B. Now, it is $4.67B.
TKO is moving ahead with the debt strategy of instead of paying that debt down they are choosing to spend money on investors and growth. TKO is paying its debt slowly believing that their earnings will eventually start reducing it.
