Shares of TV media and entertainment content providers have witnessed a sharp rally in the last 15 days after hitting multi-year lows.

Sun TV Networks, which tumbled to a low of ₹259.55 early this month, rose to ₹375 on Monday, a gain of 42 per cent. Balaji Telefilms, one of the content generators, flared up 70 per cent from its recent low of ₹28 to ₹48. Similarly, Entertainment Network, Shemaroo Entertainment, Zee Entertainment Enterprises, TV Today Network and TV Today Broadcast all have gained in the range of 30-60 per cent.

Though the Covid-19 outbreak has led to a nation-wide lockdown and hampered economic growth, broadcasting industry has been witnessing a huge uptick in TV viewership, said Motilal Oswal Financial Services.

According to analysts, in the initial shutdown period, most of the cities across India had avoided even newspapers, fearing spread of Covid-19 and that led to most newspapers organisation to shut or do partial operation only. “This forced most people turn towards television for Covid-19-related news initially and then other entertainment serials to kill boredom,” said a market observer based at Chennai.

Motilal Oswal report said: “The lockdown has positively impacted TV viewership in week-13 (starting March 39, 2020). According to a Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) report, viewership is up a significant 43 per cent since the pre Covid-19 period.” News, sports and movie genres have seen phenomenal increase in viewership while general entertainment channel, given the lack of new content, have seen limited gains.

“Listed players such as Zee TV, which are focussed on GEC, have seen limited gains, while Sun TV has seen improvement in market share,” said Motilal Oswal report.

Content switching

Meanwhile, Balaji Telefilms said, that its Digital SVOD (subscription video on demand) business ALTBalaji has seen a significant increase in engagement levels as consumers are switching their content consumption online. ALTBalaji continues to be a leader in the original Hindi SVOD space and one of the few homegrown success stories in the over-the-top space.

However, these are initial days said the Chennai-based analyst. “Though the traffic has increased, it does not necessarily mean revenues,” he cautioned. The full impact of of Covid-19 will be known only after the complete lift out, he said.