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John Cena with WWE championship
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HERE COMES THE MONEY

WrestleMania 41 was WWE’s most-watched and highest-grossing event ever

Viewership for the flagship wrestling showcase more than doubled from last year.

Millie Giles

The 41st annual WrestleMania event took place in Las Vegas over two nights on the weekend, with WWE legend-turned-actor John Cena crowned world champion for a 17th time — more than anyone else in WWE history — after pinning opponent Cody Rhodes with some help from, er, Travis Scott.

While Cena will be glad to have scooped one final belt before he retires from wrestling for good, WWE itself, which has sat in the wider TKO Group corporate stable alongside UFC since 2023, will also be basking in Sunday night’s glory...

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According to WWE, WrestleMania 41 set an all-time record for revenue, with on-site merchandise sales up more than 45% from the previous year and e-commerce revenue up 86%, making it the company’s highest-grossing event ever. It was also WWE’s most-watched event of all time: the live stadium matchups brought almost 125,000 fans through the gates over both nights and viewership was up 114% from 2024 across streaming partners Peacock and Netflix. 

World Wrestling Entertainment, which has roots as far back as 1953, when Vincent J. McMahon founded the Capitol Wrestling Corporation, penned a $5 billion deal with Netflix last January to make the platform a major international home for livestreamed events like WrestleMania. Since then, WWE’s live events division has boomed, accounting for nearly $340 million in revenue in 2024, almost 3x the amount recorded just two years prior. 

WWE revenue split chart
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Still, media deals accounted for the majority (62%) of WWE’s knockout $1.4 billion annual revenue last year — and with Peacock’s streaming deal with the brand set to expire next March, the heavyweight figures are only likely to add strength to the wrestling company’s position in renewal discussions.

Cut above the wrestle… On the business side, TKO Group has also upped the ante on sponsorship. Per WWE, WrestleMania 41 featured a record 28 partners in total, and sponsorship brought in $83 million in revenue last year.

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Lucid rises following the delivery of its first Uber robotaxi (of 20,000) and a price target bump

One down, a minimum of 19,999 to go.

In a Wednesday morning post on X featuring some of the most royalty-free music you’ve ever heard, Lucid announced it’s delivered its first Gravity SUV earmarked for service as an Uber robotaxi next year. Shares of the company climbed 3%.

The vehicle is now with autonomous driving company Nuro, which will add software and test the SUV for road readiness.

The 20,000-vehicle agreement over six years is a hefty order for Lucid, which expects to build between 18,000 and 20,000 vehicles this year.

Lucid stock could also be seeing a boost from a price target hike by Cantor Fitzgerald on Wednesday, to $26 from $20. (Remember, though, that before a 1-for-10 reverse stock split at the beginning of this month, Cantors target had been the equivalent of $30.)

Lucid shares have now risen more than 40% from their all-time closing low of a split-adjusted $16.16 on September 4.

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Disney+ subscribers are getting (another) price hike next month

Disney’s streaming prices are going to infinity and beyond.

Starting October 21, Disney+ with ads will climb to $11.99 a month (from $9.99), while the ad-free Disney+ Premium plan will rise to $18.99 (from $15.99). Annual Premium subscriptions will now cost $189.99, up from $159.99. Disney shares were flat on the news.

Bundles are getting pricier too: the Disney+/Hulu (with ads) package will jump from $10.99 to $12.99, while the Disney+/Hulu/ESPN Select bundle will rise from $16.99 to $19.99. The ad-free version of that bundle will go from $26.99 to $29.99. Even legacy bundles that subscribers were allowed to keep will see hikes. For example: the Disney+ Premium/Hulu (with ads)/ESPN Select plan will now run $24.99 instead of $21.99.

After increasing prices four times in the past four years, Disney’s streaming unit finally became profitable last year. It’s yet another example of streaming services slowly raising prices and hoping consumers don’t notice or care enough to cancel.

Disney shares are up over 20% over the past 12 months.

business

Better Home soars after Opendoor kingmaker Eric Jackson dubs it the “Shopify of mortgages”

Shares of Better Home & Finance soared over 160% Monday after EMJ Capital founder Eric Jackson posted on X, dubbing the online mortgage lender the “Shopify of mortgages.” The post drew attention to BETR’s rapid growth.

He went further, calling BETR a “potential 350-bagger in 2 years.” In a subsequent post, Jackson argued that Better ought to be worth $626 per share today, and claimed that it should be worth $12,000 per share in two years.

Now, these are bold claims, but Jackson is coming off a rather successful called shot as the primary architect of the rally in Opendoor Technologies. After a similar series of posts where Jackson argued that Opendoor would be the next Carvana, retail interest in the real estate stock soared, mobilizing an “$OPEN Army” that has managed to gain the ear of management as they propel the stock upward.

Needless to say, when Jackson talks up a stock, retail at least will hear him out.

Better Home & Finance stock is now up a massive 682% year to date.

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