According to Digital TV Research, pay TV revenues in Eastern Europe will peak at $6.95 billion in 2019 before slowly falling to $6.59 billion by 2024. Analog cable revenues are expected to drop by $844 million over the forecast period, so digital pay TV revenues are expected to increase by $502 million to $6.56 billion.
Simon Murray, principal analyst at Digital TV Research, said: "Tough times continue in Eastern Europe, with poor job prospects forcing many to seek work abroad. This migration married with low birth rates mean that the number of TV households will fall in 18 countries between 2018 and 2024 - with the region's TV households dropping by 2.5 million."
"The number of pay TV subscribers in Eastern Europe will decline from 82.33 million at end-2018 to 78.64 million in 2024," Murray said. "Not great news, but better than the U.S. situation."
Eastern Europe is slowly ridding itself of analog cable TV. There were still 17.67 million analog cable subscribers by end-2018. That total is expected to fall to 568,000 by 2024. The number of digital pay TV subscribers is expected to increase by 13 million between 2018 and 2024 to 78 million, up by 21%.