We recently published 10 Trending Stocks to Watch As AI Bubble Warnings Heat Up. TKO Group Holdings Inc (NYSE:TKO) is one of the trending stocks.
Joseph Terranova, Senior Managing Director, Virtus Investment Partners, shared some bullish comments about TKO in a recent program on CNBC.
“Purchased this at the end of July. We’ve got a little bit of a lead on the story. Upcoming earnings going to be critical here. When you look at the UFC comps are somewhat difficult. The other side of it, WWE looking for a strong quarter here. Recent announcement with the deal with ESPN. That should be a favorable one as well. Near a high. Let the stock work for you and continue to move higher.”
Cooper Investors Global Equities Fund stated the following regarding TKO Group Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:TKO) in its second quarter 2025 investor letter:
“TKO Group Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:TKO) is the owner and operator of the two leading combat sports content assets – the UFC and WWE. We wrote about TKO in our September Quarterly Report (Insights, Fund Performance & Financial Updates | Cooper Investors – Cooper Investors). Since making our initial investment, the company has also acquired Premier Bull Riding (PBR), sports marketing agency IMG and premium (sports) experience provider On Location (in a single transaction). The core UFC and WWE assets still account for the vast majority of TKO’s economics.
TKO has had a strong start to 2025; UFC and WWE grew EBITDA 17% and 38% respectively in the March quarter and the company expects to grow EBITDA at a mid-teens rate for calendar year 2025.
An important near-term milestone is the renewal of the UFC media rights in the US. These rights account for over 15% of TKO’s revenues, so while the absolute dollar gure is important (and we expect a material step-up from the current deal), we are more focused on the partners TKO chooses to work with. For example, TKO signed a landmark global deal with Net ix for the WWE last year and this is proving to unlock material upside in the other parts of content flywheel, namely sponsorship and live events (site fees and ticketing).
We also believe that there is a larger site fee opportunity for TKO, as compared to our initial expectations. TKO currently earns site fees from local governments on a portion of its 24 marquee annual events (e.g. Wrestlemania, UFC 314). Across UFC, WWE and PBR the company puts on close to 200 annual events. By “festivalising” a combination of these events across multiple days, TKO is demonstrating they can deliver more economic value to cities and hence earn site fees on previously unmonetised events…” (Click here to read the full text)
While we acknowledge the risk and potential of TKO as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than TKO and that has 10,000% upside potential, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
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