Fubo reported record North America subscriber numbers in its latest quarterly earnings, with new CEO Alisa Bowen crediting the FIFA World Cup and the company's deepening ties to majority owner Disney for the growth. The streaming service, which operates both FuboTV and Hulu + Live TV as separate products, said North America paid subscribers reached 5.75 million, up 2% year over year from 5.63 million, according to figures reported by Yahoo Finance and Stocktwits.
The results mark Bowen's first earnings call since she took over as chief executive last month, succeeding co-founder David Gandler. Bowen previously spent years as a Disney streaming executive, a background she leaned into during Wednesday's call, telling analysts she is confident Fubo will keep strengthening its relationship with Disney as the two companies explore opportunities for both Fubo and Hulu + Live TV, according to Deadline.
Disney took a 70% stake in Fubo in 2025 as part of a settlement over the antitrust lawsuit tied to the abandoned Venu Sports joint venture, which had also involved Fox Corp. and Warner Bros. Discovery. Despite the ownership change, Fubo has continued trading as a separate public company and has kept FuboTV and Hulu + Live TV distinct rather than merging them, a strategy Bowen reiterated on the call, according to Yahoo Finance.
World Cup And NBA Finals Fuel Subscriber Gains
CFO John Janedis said the World Cup had a favorable impact on subscriber levels during the quarter, contrasting a pro forma sequential subscriber decline of about 250,000 in the same quarter a year earlier with a sequential gain of 25,000 subscribers this time, Yahoo Finance reported. Bowen said the NBA Finals and the World Cup both supported subscriber performance, with particular strength in Fubo's enhanced Spanish-language offerings.
Fubo carried World Cup programming in English through Fox and in Spanish through Telemundo and Universo, after renewing its NBCUniversal partnership for the Fubo service. According to Deadline, the Telemundo carriage deal for Spanish-language World Cup broadcasts was finalized just before the tournament began in June, and the five-week event set ratings records for both Fox and Telemundo.
Management said it expects some subscriber attrition now that the tournament has ended but characterized World Cup-acquired customers as higher quality than average. Bowen said the company anticipates some post-tournament churn but views the event as a way to bring in subscribers who stick around longer, a point echoed across both the Yahoo Finance and Stocktwits accounts of the call.
ESPN Referrals And The Disney Ad Server
A recurring theme of the call was the early payoff from Fubo's expanding relationship with Disney beyond ownership. Bowen said FuboTV has begun appearing on the ESPN app, and referrals from ESPN's “Where to Watch” feature have converted from free trials to paid subscriptions at a higher rate than customers acquired through other marketing channels, while also showing favorable early retention.
“The ESPN relationship is at its very early stages and while the numbers are small, the signals are very convincing,” Bowen said, according to Deadline. She added that there is “better conversion and retention from that heavily enthusiastic sports base for the Fubo products” compared with some other marketing channels, and that tapping into the audience ESPN serves is a clear opportunity for the company.
On the advertising side, Fubo said migrating its ad inventory to the Disney Ad Server has produced double-digit year-over-year gains in both CPMs, or cost per thousand impressions, and fill rates. Janedis said June was the strongest month for Fubo's advertising business in at least several years, with CPM gains recorded across news, sports and entertainment categories despite what management had previously described as softness in entertainment advertising broadly. The technical work on the ad integration was completed in June, and Fubo took part in Disney's advertising upfront sales process for the first time this year, Bowen said.
Bowen described Disney's approach as allowing advertisers to buy reach across the broader Disney portfolio while still targeting specific audiences, and said Fubo's sports-viewing data could feed into Disney's Audience Graph to help advertisers reach sports fans across platforms. Janedis said the company reached its CPM gains sooner than expected and expects advertising to be a growth driver not just in the current quarter but in the quarters ahead.
Competing With YouTube TV, Raising Guidance
Bowen also addressed competition from YouTube TV, which has rolled out nearly a dozen new bundles at different price points in recent months, including a sports-focused package. She argued Fubo's offering stands apart because of the inclusion of Fox News in its sports package, which she said is “particularly valued” by Fubo's subscriber base.
Financially, Fubo posted North America revenue of $1.474 billion for the quarter, compared with $1.074 billion a year earlier; on a pro forma basis that assumes the Hulu + Live TV combination had already closed a year prior, revenue was roughly flat at about $1.48 billion. The company reported a net loss of $25.7 million, narrower than the $38 million loss in the same period last year, with a loss per share of $0.25 — better than the $0.38 per-share loss analysts had expected, according to Fiscal.ai data cited by Stocktwits. Adjusted EBITDA came in at $19.1 million, down from a pro forma $31 million a year earlier.
Looking at the balance sheet, Fubo ended the quarter with $236.4 million in cash. The company raised the lower end of its fiscal 2026 adjusted EBITDA guidance to a range of $90 million to $100 million, up from a prior $80 million to $100 million range, while reaffirming its longer-term target of at least $300 million in adjusted EBITDA by fiscal 2028 and positive free cash flow in both fiscal 2027 and 2028.
Despite the subscriber records and raised guidance, Fubo shares fell more than 9% in pre-market trading Wednesday, according to Stocktwits, which noted the stock is down 68% year-to-date and 80% over the past 12 months — a sharp contrast with broader small-cap benchmarks like the iShares Russell 2000 Value ETF and iShares Micro-Cap ETF, both up more than 40% over the past year. Bowen said she would offer a fuller update on Fubo's growth strategy and shareholder value initiatives on the company's next earnings call in November, focusing on distribution expansion, package segmentation and product innovation.
