Apr 28, 2020 - Economy
Business and finance becomes fastest-growing news category during coronavirus crisis
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Business and finance coverage is the fastest-growing area of news and information content during the coronavirus era, according to data from SimilarWeb.
The big picture: For the first time in several years, politics is not the top news category in America, or globally.
Driving the news: Of the several hundred global news websites measured by SimilarWeb for this analysis, business and finance news websites grew 42% year-over-year, while other types of news, like sports, lost significant traffic.
- FoxBusiness.com saw the highest percentage growth out of any business website, growing 140.5% year-over-year from last year's first quarter to this year's, per SimilarWeb.
- The fastest-growing finance and news websites also include oilprice.com, barrons.com, marketwatch.com, investing.com, money.cnn.com, fool.com (Motley Fool), ft.com, cnbc.com and wsj.com.
- Bloomberg says the number of new subscribers in March was up 178%, with average daily new subscribers up by 4x the historical rate. The company says its social-first video news network QuickTake was up 71%in March.
- CNBC says it saw a record 115 million unique visitors in March, per Comscore, an increase of 98% year-over-year.
Between the lines: Viewership of business television is also up, alongside the rest of cable news and television news, as people are stuck at home.
- Looking at the first full week in April for three key financial cable TV news networks in aggregate (CNBC, Fox Business and Bloomberg), we see 10% growth in their average audience month-over-month and 60% growth year-over year, according to a spokesperson at Comscore.
