fuboTV's (FUBO 0.72%) stock is up by over 40% in the last month. The company delivered an excellent performance in the first quarter, doubling subscribers, total revenue, and advertising revenue from the same quarter last year.
fuboTV is benefiting from a secular tailwind as consumers shift their viewing away from linear TV. Despite its run-up of late, this hypergrowth stock is still down 14% in the last six months. Let's look at why it's not too late to consider fuboTV.
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Playing with the big boys
fuboTV is a sports-centric streaming service. That targeted audience is allowing it to carve out a niche against giants like Alphabet (GOOG 0.37%) (GOOGL 0.35%) and Walt Disney (DIS -0.45%), each of whom offers a competing service to fuboTV's.
Alphabet does not report subscriber figures to its live TV streaming service, but Walt Disney's Hulu reported 3.8 million live TV subscriptions. fuboTV is smaller at 590,000 subscribers, but it's growing faster. The company more than doubled subscriptions from the same time last year, while Hulu increased by 15%.
What's more, in the most recent quarter, when Hulu lost 200,000 subscribers, fuboTV added 43,000. The end of the NFL season usually coincides with a loss of subscribers for live TV services. It was a pleasant surprise when, for the first time in the company's history, fuboTV gained subs between the fourth quarter and the first quarter.
That could indicate fuboTV is generating stronger relationships with subscribers compared to Hulu. Although it may be too early to come to this conclusion, it is certainly a good sign for those interested in the stock.
Image source: Getty Images.
Advertising growth
fuboTV supplements subscriber revenue with advertising sales. Even though it's a small part of the business right now, it's growing more important. Advertising revenue tripled in the most recent quarter to $12.6 million from $4.1 million at the same time last year. It now makes up 11% of total revenue compared to 8% last year.
The trend is a good sign for investors because advertising revenue is generally more profitable than subscription revenue. And the growth is not likely to stop here. According to a report by GroupM, connected TV ad spend is estimated to grow 25% to $16 billion this year, then reach $31 billion by 2026.
Sportsbook, international expansion
The rapid increases in subscribers and advertising revenue is perhaps what's giving management confidence to broaden the company's horizon. Later this year, fuboTV will launch an online sportsbook. From the looks of it, that could be a good idea. fuboTV attracts a sports-leaning subscriber base, which could view the option to wager with fuboTV favorably. And with an existing subscriber base, fuboTV may not have to spend lavishly on marketing or player bonuses to acquire customers in the same way that DraftKings (DKNG -1.35%) does.
Moreover, fuboTV is already testing the waters with international expansion. The company has begun operations in Canada and Spain.
fuboTV is not settling on growing its existing business in static geographies. With plans for an online sportsbook and international expansion to supplement domestic subscriber growth and advertising revenue growth, fuboTV is poised to get bigger. For those reasons, it's not too late for investors to hop aboard this hypergrowth stock.
