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Are DirecTV’s Customers About To Lose Sinclair’s TV Stations?

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Monday February 18, 2013 @ 8:34pm PSTTags: DirecTV, Sinclair Broadcasting

Here we go again. Sinclair Broadcast Group has begun to warn DirecTV customers that its 87 stations in 47 markets  may go dark on the No. 1 satellite broadcaster after February 28 when their carriage contract expires. “Although DirecTV and Sinclair have been negotiating for quite some time in an effort to reach a new agreement, at this time it does not appear that these efforts will be successful,” Sinclair’s telling viewers in Baltimore. If that’s right, then it could hit Fox especially hard: 24 of Sinclair’s stations are Fox affiliates and another 19 offer Fox-owned MyTV shows. The company also has 12 ABC stations, 16 CW, 11 CBS, 3 NBC, 1 Azteca and 1 Independent affiliate. The arguments will be familiar to anyone who has followed a retransmission consent negotiation: READ MORE »

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Sinclair Stations Could Go Dark On Dish Network Tonight

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Tuesday August 14, 2012 @ 6:55am PDTTags: Dish Network, Retransmission Consent Fees, Retransmission Consent Rules, Sinclair Broadcasting

UPDATE, 9:10 AM: Sinclair’s angry about Dish’s “corporate greed” charge, and has fired back to “set the record straight.” The broadcaster says that the retransmission consent payments it wants for its stations “are substantially lower than the amounts … Read More »

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Newport Television To Collect $1B Selling 22 Stations To Nexstar, Sinclair, And Cox

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Thursday July 19, 2012 @ 10:17am PDTTags: Big Deals TV, Nexstar, Providence Equity Partners, Sinclair Broadcasting

Newport is Providence Equity’s holding company for the collection of TV stations the private equity firm bought in 2007 from Clear Channel. Investors seem to like Nexstar’s $285.5M agreement today for 12 Newport stations; Nexstar shares are +5.2% at mid-day. Sinclair is more complicated: In addition to the $412.5M it’s paying for six Newport stations, Sinclair agreed today to pay $40M for Tampa-based Bay Television. Sinclair shares are -1.6%. Privately held Cox is paying $302M for its four stations.

Here’s the release: Read More »

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Sinclair Renews Affiliation Deal With Fox, With Option To Buy Baltimore O&O

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Tuesday May 15, 2012 @ 7:39am PDTTags: Fox Broadcasting, Fox TV Stations, Sinclair Broadcasting

BALTIMORE, May 15, 2012 — Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: SBGI), announced today that it has entered into an agreement with the Fox Broadcasting Company (FOX) for the renewal of the affiliation agreements for 19 television stations Sinclair owns and/or programs. The new agreements go into effect January 1, 2013 upon the expiration of the existing affiliation agreements and expire December 31, 2017. KFXA-TV, the FOX affiliate in Cedar Rapids, to which Sinclair provides certain non-programming related services, is also renewing its affiliation agreement for the same term.

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Moody’s: Dreary Prospects For TV Stations Despite 2012 Pop From Political Ads

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Wednesday February 1, 2012 @ 9:37am PSTTags: Gray Television, LIN TV, Media General, Nexstar, Sinclair Broadcasting

It will take years before most ad sales will hit the peaks that TV stations saw in 2007, Moody’s Investors Service analyst Carl Salas says this morning in an industry report. Local businesses have been slow to increase their spending after the economy tanked in 2008 and 2009 — and now broadcasters must compete for those dollars against websites, social media, digital displays and other emerging media. Sure, stations will see some extra cash from retransmission consent deals with pay TV providers. But it won’t be a windfall: Major networks are demanding reverse compensation agreements from their affiliates, giving the national broadcasters much of the dough collected by the stations that they used to pay to carry their programs. Read More »

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Report: TV Stations Face Cash Flow Woes As Networks Demand Rising Payments

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Tuesday November 29, 2011 @ 9:44am PSTTags: ABC, Belo Corp, CBS, Fox, Gray Television, LIN TV, NBC, Nexstar, Retransmission Consent Fees, Sinclair Broadcasting

Station groups including Belo, Gray Television, LIN Media, NexStar Broadcasting, and Sinclair Broadcast face a big problem after next year’s elections when the cash from political ads evaporates: Their revenues and cash flow could plummet as they’re forced to … Read More »

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Media Stocks Up On Strong Holiday Sales And Hope Of European Debt Solution

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Monday November 28, 2011 @ 9:40am PSTTags: Big Media, CBS, Cinedigm, Comcast, Crown Media, Disney, Madison Square Garden, Netflix, News Corp, RealD, Sinclair Broadcasting, Sony, Time Warner, Viacom, Westwood One

Shoppers spent a record $52.4B over the four-day Thanksgiving weekend, up 16% from last year, the National Retail Federation says. Add that to reports that European leaders are getting serious about resolving their debt crisis, and it’s easy … Read More »

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Sinclair To Buy Freedom Stations For $385M

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Wednesday November 2, 2011 @ 6:32am PDTTags: Sinclair Broadcasting

Sinclair Broadcasting this morning unveiled third-quarter revenue of $180.8 million, which is down 3% from a year ago but beat Wall Street estimates, and the company used its sold earnings report to announce it has acquired eight TV stations from … Read More »

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Media Stocks -5.4% As Fresh Data Suggest The Economy Continues To Weaken

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Thursday August 18, 2011 @ 12:13pm PDTTags: Amazon, Cablevision, CBS, Cinedigm, Coinstar, Comcast, Discovery Communications, Disney, Entercom, Gannett, IMAX, LIN TV, Lionsgate, Live Nation Entertainment, McClatchy, McGraw-Hill, Netflix, News Corp, Pandora Media, Radio One, Scripps Networks Interactive, Sinclair Broadcasting, Sony, Stock Market, Time Warner, TiVo, Viacom, Washington Post

The bears are back. After a relatively calm week, stocks prices across the board — including in media — are tanking today following reports that point to rising unemployment and inflation, and weakness in manufacturing. An hour before … Read More »

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UPDATE: Media Stocks End Day -7.3% As Markets Grapple With S&P’s Debt Downgrade

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Monday August 8, 2011 @ 11:22am PDTTags: AMC Networks, Barnes & Noble, Cablevision, CBS, Coinstar, Comcast, Dow Jones, DreamWorks Animation, Entercom, Liberty Media, LIN TV, McClatchy, McGraw-Hill, News Corp, Pandora Media, Rovi, Sinclair Broadcasting, Sirius XM, Sony, Time Warner, TiVo, Viacom, Westwood One

UPDATE, 2 PM: The market deteriorated as the day wore on, continuing the worst market slump since 2008. The Dow Jones U.S. Broadcasting and Entertainment Index closed down 7.3% — exceeding the 5.6% decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, 6.7% drop in the Standard & Poor’s 500, and 6.9% fall at NASDAQ.  CBS’ -10.3% slide made it the leading loser among media’s Big Guns. It was followed by News Corp (-7.7%), Viacom (-7.1%), Comcast (-6.6%), Sony (-6.4%), Disney (-6.1%), and Time Warner (-5.8%).

Double-digit losers include AMC Networks (-12.8%), LIN TV (-12.7%), Sirius XM (-12.7%), RealD (-12.6%), Cumulus Media (-11.9%), TiVo (-11.4%), Entercom (-10.9%), Westwood One (-10.8%), and E.W. Scripps (-10.3%). Those losing at least 9% include National CineMedia, Dish Network, Arbitron, Sinclair Broadcasting, Rovi, Outdoor Channel, Crown Media, Electronic Arts, Cablevision, and Coinstar. Read More »

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UPDATE: Media Stocks Continue To Suffer As Recession Fears Spread

By DAVID LIEBERMAN, Executive Editor | Thursday August 4, 2011 @ 11:52am PDTTags: CBS, Disney, Live Nation, New York Times, News Corp, Sinclair Broadcasting, Sony, Time Warner, TiVo, Viacom, Westwood One

UPDATE, 1:30 PM: Fear that the economy may be headed back into recession seemed to grow in the last hour of trading. The Dow ended the day -4.3% at 11,383.68. It was the biggest single-day drop since Oct. 22, 2008 and took the Dow below where it was at the beginning of 2011. Similarly, the S&P 500 was -4.8% and NASDAQ was -5.1%.

Although most media companies remain well ahead of where they were a year ago, today’s losses still look ugly. CBS, down 9.3%, was the hardest-hit infotainment giant. Here’s how the other Big Guns fared: News Corp -6.7%, Sony -6.5%, Disney -5.6%, Time Warner -4.6%, Comcast -4.3%, and Viacom -3.4%.

Among other media companies, Comscore finished -38.3% and Westwood One was -13.2%. Sinclair Broadcasting and McClatchy each lost more than 9%. Cinedigm, Live Nation, TiVo, and Liberty Media fell at least 8%. And Yahoo, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, The New York Times Company, Coinstar, and Dish Network lost at least 7%. Even World Wrestling Entertainment, which had been up earlier in the day, closed -1.4%.

The only company in the sector that gained ground today was Pandora Media. It ended +1.6% after Bank of America Merrill Lynch initiated coverage with a “buy” recommendation. Read More »

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