Exclusive: Business Live dropped from Sky News in ‘premium’ push
Sky News has cancelled its daily Business Live news programme, leaving the channel without a stand-alone business programme for the first time since 2007, City PM can reveal.
The broadcaster’s top brass informed staff about the decision in a memo on Monday evening, telling editorial employees that the show “will not return to the TV and streaming schedule this autumn”.
“Business, economics and consumer finance are essential pillars of the 2030 strategy, and we want to direct our market-leading journalism to our growing premium digital offering”, Jonathan Levy, executive editor of Sky News UK told staff in an email seen by City PM.
The move is the latest part of a major strategic overhaul announced by boss David Rhodes in January, which has seen the channel shift its focus away from live and rolling news to produce more “premium video” as well as newsletters and podcasts.
The new strategy – called Sky News 2030 – is an effort to diversify the broadcaster’s revenue streams from its traditional sponsorship and advertising avenues, to more lucrative paths like subscription models and ticketed events.
The outlet boasts a deep bench of business and economics reporters, including formidable City editor – and City PM columnist – Mark Kleinman, high-profile economics editor Ed Conway and business correspondent Paul Kelso, all of whom are unaffected by the scheduling change.
As part of the shake-up, bosses at the channel, which was bought by US media juggernaut Comcast in 2018, have overseen a concerted push into several successful podcasts.
Trump 100 – a show initially meant to document the first 100 days of the US President’s second stint in the White House but which has since been extended – has attracted millions of downloads since its launch in January – while Electoral Dysfunction, a political podcast, has hosted several ticketed events across the UK.
It also unveiled Full Story Films in May, a new long-form documentary unit the channel hopes will bolster its premium documentary-making amid fierce competition from big streamers and traditional terrestrial players.
Sky’s decision to scrap Business Live – formerly Ian King Live – comes just months after veteran presenter King left the programme in December after 12 years at the helm. He was replaced by Darren McCaffrey, who has presented to programme since the start of 2025.
Sky also recently took the decision to move production of the show from a small studio in the City to its Osterley headquarters in west London.
Axing the show altogether means the channel’s line-up will now be without a flagship programme devoted to business news for the first time in nearly 18 years.
But in his memo on Monday evening, Levy stressed that “business and economics content will continue to feature in [Sky’s] flagship TV shows”.
Business Live’s current anchor – Darren McAffrey – will continue to appear across Sky programmes, a Sky spokeswoman confirmed.