You are given a text that consists of multiple sentences. Your task is to perform abstractive summarization on this text. Use your understanding of the content to express the main ideas and crucial details in a shorter, coherent, and natural sounding text. 
Text: Leading today's discussion are Vince McMahon, WWE's Chairman and CEO; Nick Khan, WWE's President and Chief Revenue Officer; Stephanie McMahon, WWE's Chief Brand Officer; and Kristina Salen, WWE's Chief Financial Officer.
Their remarks will be followed by a Q&A session.
Actual results may differ materially and undue reliance should not be placed on them.
Additionally, the matters we will be discussing today may include non-GAAP financial measures.
As you can see we're generating some pretty strong financial results in a very challenging environment.
We continue to produce content, we never missed a week in terms of producing content.
It shows the flexibility and our commitment to our audience, which we will always have.
We transitioned our flagship programs through our training facility.
And then of course, to the Amway Center and then continued on to to what -- to something we called the ThunderDome was a great name, any event, it's a -- most of you have seen it.
And there's nothing like it on television allows us to have live fans.
They're just not in seats.
And some of the other things I do want to mention.
Certainly, we -- our multi-year agreement with NBC U is on the big box service.
To my knowledge, I don't think there's any really big deal that's been announced ever since the COVID stuff began.
I really think that's pretty extraordinary on their part, and definitely on our part as well.
And again, we just -- this agreement is really awesome for our WWE fans, our W Universe, as we call it, it's just gives them more -- more value, not just the WWE 999, which is a great value for what we do.
But then again, they for less money, they pick up our, our network, as well as all sorts of entertainment.
So it's great for our fans.
I think that Nick and Stephanie and Kristina are going to provide a little more perspective on this development.
Looking ahead to 2021.
Now, we expect to continue to manage the challenges of the COVID environment, and it continues on.
We no doubt will expect a gradual return to ticketed audiences.
And that is something that, sure, OK, we have live events, but live events make any money, you're going to get 20% capacity, 30%, 50%, whereas you breakeven, and so best to be determined by anyone who's in the live event business and hardly anyone has a handle on exactly when that's going to happen.
Nonetheless, we are ready.
We are the most flexible, adaptable media company in the world.
We can turn something around as far as a live event in six weeks.
And it just speaks to our ability to innovate as a media company and continue to, in this current environment, create long term value.
So that's generally pretty much where we are.
And, Nick, take it away.
A week and a half ago, we made what we believe was a big announcement regarding WWE and Peacock.
Starting on March 18, the entire WWE Network and its content will shift to Peacock in the United States.
This includes WrestleMania, our vast library and all of our pay-per-view events, starting with Fastlane on March 21.
As part of this partnership, WWE will maintain access to valuable audience data.
As we all know, Peacock is free to Comcast, Xfinity and Cox Cable customers.
So watching Fastlane and subsequently WrestleMania on April 10 and 11th will be free to all of those consumers.
Additionally, WWE Network will be available for $4.99 a month on the ad supported Peacock tier, which is half the price that Vince just mentioned, of $9.99 a month.
The price we have been charging for WWE Network in the United States and will continue to be no upcharge of any kind, for any of our events.
499 price is the all in price for our great library and pay per view in ring action.
In addition to the office Saturday Night Live, Modern Family to dick wolf franchises, the English Premier League and the Olympic Games.
I believe the last time we all spoke in October; we collectively discussed how the recent org structure changes at NBC, you and Disney are indicative of the fact that streaming had become a top priority for both companies.
Many months in advance of those org structure changes, we started to engage in deep conversations with multiple buyers in the marketplace about a potential deal.
Ultimately, we felt like the partnership with Peacock was the right move at the right time for our fans and shareholders.
It was Vince McMahon and WWE who were the first movers from closed circuit to pay per view.
It was Vince and WWE that were the first movers out of pay per view and into the SVOD world in 2014.
And WWE is now again the first mover from a stand-alone SVOD for partnering with a media conglomerate that has tremendous assets, reach and promotional power.
With the Peacock deal closed domestically, our focus now shifts to international markets.
In addition to distributing our great domestic content internationally, our focus is to also develop content that is specifically targeted to fans in certain international territories.
Two examples of this I'd like to discuss here today.
We recently produced a two hour in ring special with our partner in India, Sony, which featured our developing Indian Superstars.
The event, which premiered across Sony's platforms on India's Republic Day was available on Sony TEN one, Sony TEN three and Sony MAX, which have a combined reach of 50 million households, as well as on Sony's streaming platform SonyLIV.
The event took place at the WWE ThunderDome to an all Indian virtual audience.
It was announced in Hindi and English, and incorporated stunning and contemporary elements of Indian culture.
The international music sensation known as Spinning Canvas, executed an amazing performance in honor of India's national holiday.
We await for live plus seven numbers, which will obviously substantially add to the total viewership number.
We believe this event will further grow our product in India, which is already a robust WWE market and demonstrates our commitment to our partner, Sony, and our WWE fans in India.
This event is a credit to Vince, Paul Levesque, otherwise known as Triple H and the entire creative and production team who put together this event during a pandemic, while also producing three to four other live in-ring shows a week.
You can look forward to more from us in India along these lines.
The second area of our international focus is Latin America and localizing content tailored toward that region.
A key part of our strategy is bringing in authentic talent who resonate with particular international markets.
You may have seen or read that on the Royal Rumble pay-per-view this past Sunday, Puerto Rican Superstar Bad Bunny performed his new hit single Booker T, which is based on our WWE Hall of Fame Superstar of the same name.
An internationally acclaimed recording artist, Bad Bunny's songs were streamed on Spotify more than 8.3 billion times in 2020, helping to make him the most streamed artist in the world that year.
Then low and behold, at the instigation of one of WWE's up and coming Puerto Rican stars, Damian Priest, Bunny got physically involved later in the night, setting the stage for future storylines.
As of this past Wednesday, this collaboration has led to over 35 million total video views and 2.5 million engagements across YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Total media impressions to date are nearly 170 million, and it was reported on by the top sports and entertainment properties ranging from ESPN to Rolling Stone to Telemundo to TMZ.
And within 24 hours, the co-branded Bad Bunny WWE merchandise became the hottest selling drop we've had on record on our e-commerce platform, WWE Shop.
An idea which was born simply from seeing the cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine last October, has evolved into one of the most engaging pop culture collaborations in our history, with a targeted focus on the Latinx community.
Look for more of us in the -- look for more of this, excuse me, in the LATAM region.
In addition to our work in India and LATAM, we also closed new international deals with IV Media in Korea and Foxtel in Australia.
And in China, we expanded our broadcast footprint, which already included iQiyi, Yoku and PP Sports by launching Raw on Tencent Video.
Let's also discuss some out of the ring opportunities and deals we are excited about as we continue to expand WWE's brand Beyond The Ring.
In terms of original programming from our WWE Studio, we continue to develop our slate.
As you may know, WWE used to finance productions.
We stopped doing that a few years ago.
Instead, we're licensing content, both scripted and unscripted, to buyers in the marketplace.
We are pleased at how quickly our portfolio has continued to grow.
A few new developments include a multi episode unscripted series order created by and voiced by John Cena, which will be produced with WWE Studios.
Additionally, we have closed the deal for WWE Studios to join the NBC show Young Rock, a long time, long time WWE family member, Dwayne Johnson, and my actual family member, my sister, Nahnatchka Khan.
The show premieres on Tuesday, February 16, on NBC.
And finally, as you may be aware, we sent championship title belts to many of the major sports lead teams who have won championships.
And in some cases, our title belts are more popular than their own trophy.
You may have seen Lebron James hold up a WWE championship title belt after winning the NBA title.
The Golden State Warriors have done the same as well as the Los Angeles Dodgers and many other teams.
This led us to close a deal with a major sports league, where you will be seeing WWE championship title belts that will be made using the team logos of some of the most prominent pro sports franchises.
It's a real testament to the power of our brand.
One of the lessons Vince always taught me in business was to always be slightly ahead of the curve, not so far ahead that people don't understand what you're doing and certainly not behind.
WWE was ahead of the curve with the advent of pay-per-view, bringing WrestleMania directly into people's homes.
Social media allowed one-to-one connection between our superstars and our fans.
And when consumers started migrating to what was then a new short-form platform called YouTube, WWE became one of YouTube's original paid content partners.
When research showed our audience was 5 times more likely to consume online video, we cannibalized our pay-per-view business and launched the first live SVOD service of its kind, WWE network.
And now we're ahead of the curve again, licensing WWE Network, our most premium content, to one of America's premier streaming services, NBCU's Peacock.
Because the landscape has changed.
COVID-19 and quarantine accelerated a behavioral viewership shift to streaming platforms.
Streaming behemoths are investing heavily in technology and infrastructure in order to scale with operational efficiencies creating more flexible pricing options.
And the biggest thing all of these providers have in common is the need for branded content.
In order to be competitive, we need to pivot away from the technology necessary for an optimum user experience and allocate our resources against what we do best: content creation, production and storytelling.
And we get to do it with a trusted partner we have had for over 30 years, NBCU.
Partnering with NBCU's Peacock not only provides a greater value proposition for our current subscribers.
It also allows us to deliver our most premium content to a significantly larger audience, including the 33 million people who have already signed up for the service.
Additionally, this partnership gives greater access to NBCU's best-in-class teams across sales, marketing and promotion as well as some of the most iconic franchises in the United States and around the world.
Just imagine, with NBCU and Peacock, every three years is a Super Bowl, every two years is the Olympics, and every year is WrestleMania.
We believe more than ever in the power of our brand.
In 2020, WWE's television viewership held steady once we transitioned out of the Performance Center and invested in WWE ThunderDome.
In fact, over the period from August 21 through year-end, which covers our move to the Amway Center and subsequently to Tropicana Field, Raw viewership is essentially unchanged and SmackDown viewership has increased 8% compared to the prior three-month period.
During the fourth quarter, digital views increased an estimated 25% and hours consumed increased 44%, excluding the impact of geographical restrictions in India.
In 2020 as a whole, we saw a record 38 billion views and 1.4 billion hours consumed across our AVOD platforms, both representing a 10% increase year-over-year and an 11% increase in revenue.
In order to reach new audiences, we maintained our pop culture strategy, bringing celebrities and influencers into our programming and casting WWE superstars outside of our content.
In the quarter, Matthew McConaughey's appearance in the ThunderDome and in other WWE content generated five million impressions.
In fact, Jimmy Kimmel used the footage from the ThunderDome in an interview with Matthew just this week.
The biggest opportunity outside of WWE programming was bar none SmackDown women's champion, Sasha Banks, appearing as a recurring character in Season two of Disney's Mandalorian.
And as Nick already highlighted, this past week, multi platinum artist and award-winning singer song writer Bad Bunny not only performed at the Royal Rumble, he got physically involved, diving off the top rope and then showed up again on Monday Night Raw the next night driving a Bugatti.
I think it was the first time I've ever seen a Bugatti on Raw.
Bad Bunny, one of the most recognized Latinx performers of our generation said being a WWE Superstar has always been his dream.
As a final measure of our brand strength, our advertising and sales revenue outpaced industry trends throughout the year.
The quarter was highlighted by an increase in gaming partner activations, including Wargaming World of Tanks, Cyberpunk 2077, 2K Battlegrounds and Microsoft Gears.
Additionally, we signed a multiyear partnership with our first banking partner, Credit One, as well as our first official beer partnership with Constellation Brands focusing on Victoria, Corona and Modelo.
In fact, if you were watching the Royal Rumble on Sunday night, you would have seen WWE Superstar Rey Mysterio, a lucha legend, wearing the Victoria brand on his mask.
Rey also posted to a 3.6 million followers on Instagram in Spanish about how proud he was to partner with a brand as authentic to the Latino fan base as Victoria.
Forbes, Complex and Sports Illustrated were just a few of the outlets that highlighted this integration.
And 2021 is already off to a promising start, kicking off a multiyear partnership with cricket wireless as the presenting sponsor of the Royal Rumble, a custom content series with first-time partner GM for the rollout of their Silverado campaign and the announcement of Mars' Snickers as the returning sponsor of WrestleMania for the sixth consecutive year.
WWE is the perfect partner as more and more brands look to engage consumers with customized content creation and authentic influencers.
When you couple that with our over one billion followers across digital and social platforms as well as our broadcast, cable and streaming partners, Fox, USA and Peacock in the states, WWE is poised now more than ever to deliver scale, engagement and reach.
Today, I'll review WWE's financial performance, liquidity and capital structure and business outlook.
As a reminder, all comparisons are versus the year ago quarter unless I say otherwise.
For the year, WWE achieved record revenue and record profit.
WWE's adjusted OIBDA of $286.2 million was at the high end of our rescinded guidance and reflected nearly a 60% increase of more than $100 million.
This growth was driven primarily by higher rights fees from WWE's U.S. Distribution Agreement.
Throughout 2020, WWE managed a challenging environment, particularly for producers of live content.
We estimate that WWE lost more than $90 million in revenue as a result of COVID-19 restrictions, primarily from the loss of ticket sales and the postponement of large-scale international events.
WWE never went off the air.
This was a remarkable achievement.
But it does foreshadow a tough comparison for 2021.
In the fourth quarter, the absence of a large-scale international event contributed to a 50% or $56.4 million reduction in fourth quarter adjusted OIBDA, which also reflected lower advertising revenue and higher TV production costs.
Looking at the WWE's Media segment, adjusted OIBDA decreased 37% or approximately $44 million to $73 million, primarily due to the aforementioned event loss and, to a lesser extent, decreased advertising sales and higher production costs.
On December 11, we transitioned the WWE ThunderDome, our state-of-the-art environment for producing Raw and SmackDown to a temporary residency at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida.
In that stadium setting, we bring nearly 1,000 live virtual fans back to our show and surround them with pyrotechnics, laser displays, augmented reality and drone cameras.
This staging increases production costs by approximately 25% per episode.
We expect this investment to continue through at least the first half of 2021 as it brings a high level of excitement to our programs and most importantly, brings our fans back into the show.
Despite a challenging environment, WWE continued to produce a significant amount of content.
More than 700 hours of programming in the quarter and more than 2,300 hours for the year across television, streaming and social and digital platforms.
As we prepare to transition the WWE Network to Peacock, we continue to utilize on the growth in digital consumption, promoting content sampling and subscriptions with the free version of WWE Network.
Since the pandemic began WWE subscriptions and consumption have been up meaningfully.
In the fourth quarter, 2.2 million total viewers watched content across all tiers, representing a 40% increase and those viewers watched 35 million hours of content, which was 14% higher.
Perhaps most importantly, average paid subscribers to the network increased 6% to 1.5 million.
Adjusted OIBDA from Live Events declined by $4.9 million to a loss of $6.7 million due to a $26.7 million decline in Live Events revenue.
These declines were due to the loss of ticket revenue resulting from the cancellation of events.
Until mid-March, WWE held arena and stadium based events in front of ticketed audiences.
During the fourth quarter, however, WWE held no ticketed events.
We are delighted to have announced the return of WrestleMania to Tampa Bay on Saturday, April 10 and Sunday, April 11, 2021 and at Raymond James Stadium with ticket availability and safety protocols forthcoming.
However, it remains challenging to predict the pace at which we will return to a weekly live event schedule.
We do not anticipate the staging of other ticketed events until at least the second half of 2021.
The drop in video game sales was anticipated as WWE and Take-Two had previously determined to delay the release of WWE's franchise game until 2021.
WWE continued to introduce new products, expand its video game portfolio and develop partnerships across product categories.
For example, during the quarter, WWE continued to build out its video game portfolio, launching WWE Undefeated and WWE Racing Showdown in partnership with Indway and JetSynthesys, respectively.
As of year-end, WWE had 140 million installs across its games portfolio.
Demonstrating our commitment to product innovation, WWE released 2,000 new products on its e-commerce platform including 18 new championship title cells, which generated category growth of more than 100% for the year.
In 2020, we generated approximately $292 million in free cash flow, an increase of $240 million.
The increase was driven by improved working capital, the timing of collections associated with large-scale international events, stronger operating performance and to a lesser extent, lower capital expenditures.
As of December 31, 2020, WWE held $593 million in cash and short-term investments.
This included $100 million borrowed under WWE's revolving credit facility which was repaid just in January 2021.
And finally, a word on WWE's business outlook.
Last week, we issued guidance for 2021 adjusted OIBDA.
As previously indicated, WWE expects restrictions related to the spread of COVID-19, particularly related to ticketed live events to continue at least through the first half of 2021.
Additionally, we anticipate a significant year-over-year increase in expense due to continued higher TV production expenses at WWE's ThunderDome as well as the return of employees from furlough.
We estimate that WWE can achieve 2021 adjusted OIBDA of $270 million to $305 million as revenue growth driven by the Peacock transaction, the gradual ramp-up of ticketed live events, including large-scale international events, and the escalation of core content rights fees is offset by the increase in production and personnel expenses.
In our view, the stated 2021 adjusted OIBDA guidance range will be approximately 15% to 20% higher without the ongoing impact of COVID-19, which includes the loss of ticket and merchandise sales of live events and the increased investment in production to further fan engagement.
Turning to WWE's capital expenditures.
In early 2020, and we deferred spending on the company's new headquarters.
Given increasing visibility regarding WWE's projected performance and liquidity, we are planning to restart this project in the second half of '21.
For 2021, we estimate total capital expenditures of $65 million to $85 million, including funds to begin construction as well as funds to enhance WWE's technology infrastructure.
We are in the process of reevaluating the headquarters project, and we will provide further guidance on future capital expenditures when that work is completed.
For the first quarter of 2021, we estimate adjusted OIBDA will decline as incremental profits from Peacock and higher content rights fees are more than offset by the absence of ticketed events, including a large-scale international event, and increased production costs.
The timing and rate of returning ticketed audiences to WWE's Live Events remains subject to significant uncertainty.
And as such, we are not reinstating more specific quarterly guidance at this time.
And finally, I'd like to take a moment and talk about WWE's financial outlook in a post-COVID world, whenever that may be.
As analysts and investors will likely use the ex COVID range of 2021 adjusted OIBDA guidance to estimate future performance, I would note that 2022 and future years will be impacted by a variety of factors.
Certainly, the contractual escalation of WWE's core content rights fees will continue to be an important source of growth.
However, other factors may temper that growth.
Based on the accounting treatment of Peacock revenue, for example, we expect the highest incremental impact of the Peacock transaction to be booked in 2021.
Another key factor to note in the WWE post-COVID business model is that while TV production costs may decline somewhat in 2022 relative to 2021, costs will likely remain higher than in 2019.
This is due to the shift in 2020 to a Monday/Friday production schedule compared to a Monday/Tuesday schedule previously.
Incremental costs related to this change were masked in 2020 by residency in various locations, particularly in WWE's own Performance Center in the early months of COVID.
WWE continues to adapt its business to the changing environment.
As Vince, Nick and Stephanie indicated, we believe WWE can and will continue to innovate across all business lines as we execute our strategic objectives.
We look forward to sharing progress on these initiatives with you all in the future.
Carina, we're ready now.

user
world wrestling entertainment - anticipates a significant year-over-year increase in wwe's expense base due to return of employees from furlough.
estimates can achieve 2021 adjusted oibda of $270 - $305 million as revenue growth.
world wrestling entertainment- estimates that stated 2021 adjusted oibda guidance range would be 15% - 20% higher without ongoing impact of covid-19.
world wrestling entertainment- estimates of future performance beyond 2021 will be impacted by return of businesses and various other factors.
management is not reinstating quarterly guidance at this time.
world wrestling entertainment - timing and rate of returning ticket audiences to its live events remains subject to significant uncertainty.
continues to believe that wwe has significant long-term opportunities and is well positioned.
cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments were $593 million as of december 31, 2020.

assistant