ESPN Is Hemorrhaging Subscribers

Think the cord-cutting trend was an overblown fad? Think again.

According to a Nielsen N.V. NLSN analysis by Fox Sports, ESPN lost 1.5 million subscribers in a four-month span from February to May of this year. That increases the number of dropped subscribers to 10 million since 2013.

Put another way, that's about $1.5 billion in lost revenue for the sports cable giant (with the average subscriber worth about $80 a year to ESPN).

ESPN, which is owned by Walt Disney Co DIS, has come to embody the struggle that traditional broadcasters are facing against new competition that has made it easier for consumers to give up their expensive cable packages, like Netflix, Inc. NFLX, Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN and Hulu.

ESPN's subscriber count sits around 89 million right now, which equates to to about $7 billion per year. That's far more than their competitors, however the problem is they also owe roughly $6 billion per year in sports rights fees.

That could spell trouble for Disney, which made $4.4 billion in profits from its broadcast cable division in 2015, which represented more than half the company's total income.

Disney shares closed Tuesday at $99.20, down 1.07 percent.