Brandon Thurston
@brandonthurston
Email: brandon @wrestlenomics.com | Signal: BrandonThurston.14
In Q2, WWE's live events segment reports $152M, down from $185.7M in the same quarter last year. The decrease is due to lower ticket sales revenue, "almost exclusively related to WrestleMania 42 in Las Vegas, compared to the prior year."
WWE merger lawsuit settlement details disclosed in 10-Q: "WWE's portion of the overall settlement amount is $105.0 million, which is expected to be funded by probable insurance recoveries of $75M, resulting in an expected loss of $30M"
TKO Q2 earnings results. The company upgrades its revenue and adjusted EBITDA targets for the full year of 2026...
Grant v. WWE is effectively closed. Judge Sarah F. Russell ordered the pending motions moot. The Court does not actually need to approve the dismissal itself because all parties signed the notice last Friday. Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(ii): www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp/r...
The stipulation to dismiss Grant v. WWE & Vince McMahon has been filed. It now just needs approval from Judge Sarah F. Russell, and the case in public court will formally end. Litigation of Janel Grant's claims will continue in private arbitration. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
Netflix's every-six-months "What We Watched" report provides another installment of (first-party) data to assess whether viewership of WWE programs on the streaming platform is up, down, or about the same. Read the article: wrestlenomics.com/articles/202...
The parties in Janel Grant’s lawsuit against WWE and Vince McMahon provide update to the court saying they’ve signed an agreement to go to private arbitration. Within five days they will file to dismiss the case so it cannot be refiled. The judge will need to approve.
Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin's order granting 14-day temporary restraining order on the Paramount-WBD merger. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
The legal story behind the legal story about how these voice messages were ordered to be made public is here, from when the judge made the earlier decision. With legal filings by WWE’s General Counsel and me. open.substack.com/pub/wrestlen...
Ari Emanuel in another voice message on Sept 19, 2022, to Vince McMahon: "I think whether it be the DOJ or anything, there's ways around this to figure this out." www.postwrestling.com/2026/07/01/a...
NEW: Audio released of Ari Emanuel’s 2022 offer of legal help to Vince McMahon amid federal investigations: “There’s ways around this” Full article & audio of the 3 voice memos: www.postwrestling.com/2026/07/01/a...
BREAKING: Janel Grant, Vince McMahon & WWE jointly ask court to move sex trafficking lawsuit into private arbitration. Pending approval from the court, sex trafficking lawsuit against McMahon & WWE will likely soon move out of public. Story for @postwrestling.com soon...
Plaintiffs in class action lawsuit over WWE's move of PLEs to ESPN streaming point to the separate merger lawsuit for why discovery should not be stayed. They argue WWE can't be trusted to preserve evidence, pointing to recent ruling against Nick Khan for destroying evidence.
Read the full opinion, embedded in the article, from Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster. www.postwrestling.com/2026/05/27/v...
Names on the witness lists filed as part of the parties' proposed joint order, awaiting formal approval from Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster. Read the article at @postwrestling.com: www.postwrestling.com/2026/05/26/v...
In the related case, Judge Katherine Oler found that Events DC is a government agency. Expecting more unsuccessful arguments by Events DC before they are inevitably forced to comply with the law and provide records showing how taxpayer dollars were spent.
Events DC's effort to evade FOIA isn't going well. They partnered w/ WWE. I req'd records on John Cena's retirement show. The Court ruled in a related case over RFK Stadium records that Events DC is subject to DC FOIA. In my case v. Events DC, Judge Darlene Soltys concurred.
NEW: AEW sues TrillerTV for $5M in overdue payments - AEW's suit reveals PPV splits. - Separately, TrillerTV (Flipps Media) is also suing its parent co for abandonment and to consider bankruptcy. - Court granted Flipps' request to fast-track that case. www.postwrestling.com/2026/05/11/a...
NEW: Nick Khan testified that DOJ investigated sex trafficking, undermining Vince McMahon’s “minor accounting errors” statement In a deposition, Khan described search warrants containing sex trafficking language sent by McMahon’s lawyers to WWE’s lawyers. www.postwrestling.com/2026/05/07/n...
Both deals contained non-competes that largely closed out the networks' right to air non-WWE pro wrestling. MLW alleged in its 2023 antitrust case that such clauses existed. This confirms they did for these 2. These deals are now expired but raise questions about current terms.
Since the merger was completed in September 2023, TKO's stock is up 86% as of today's closing price.
The filings: TKO's 2024 proxy (Nick Khan's comp on p. 57): sec.gov/ix?doc=/Arch... TKO's 2025 proxy (Nick Khan's comp on p. 59, other executives for both years on p. 41) sec.gov/ix?doc=/Arch...
Amid reports some WWE talent were asked to take pay cuts by as much as 50%, how are some top TKO & WWE executives compensated YOY (determined by TKO Board comp committee)? 2024➡️2025: Ari Emanuel: +272%, $18M➡️$67M Mark Shapiro: +33%, $32M➡️$43M Nick Khan: +304%, $6M➡️$24M
Simpler times... Feb 12, 2015 WWE earnings call: Needham analyst Laura Martin asks Vince what the deal is with #CancelWWENetwork that trended after Roman Reigns won the Royal Rumble. He reassures her and the market it was only "a vocal minority."
Data here from WWE's own disclosures, charts mine. Vince McMahon also downplayed "the vocal minority" in 2015. Fan-driven business was okay, then declined from 2017 to 2019. But overall finances were great thanks to overwhelmingly offsetting guaranteed TV rights fees.
Happy TKO proxy statement day. TKO CEO Ari Emanuel was paid $67.4 million in 2025. TKO President & COO Mark Shapiro, $42.6 million. www.sec.gov/Archives/edg...