Posts for Ticker ‘CBS’

Sirius XM (SIRI) And CBS (CBS) Pose Greatest Financial Risk Among Media Firms

TVCBS (NYSE:CBS) and Sirius XM (NYSE:SIRI) pose the greatest investment risks among media companies based on a forensic measure of their transparency and the statistical reliability of their financial reporting and governance practices, according to new data from Audit Integrity. The probability for bankruptcy for Sirius is 8.5% and 4.6% for CBS. Both numbers are remarkably low, but still high for major US companies. Audit Integrity’s bankruptcy model achieved 90.9% accuracy in 2008 and 93.8% in 2009.

The safest companies for investors, based on the same measurement are Disney (NYSE:DIS) and  DirecTV (NYSE:DTV). The rest of the firms in the analysis are Time Warner (NYSE:TWX), Viacom (NYSE:VIA), Comcast (NYSE:CMCSA), Cablevision, (NYSE:CVC), GE (NYSE:GE), and Time Warner Cable (NYSE:TWC). Read More »

Posted on: November 12, 2009 – 9:23 pm in Accounting, Media, Old Media, , , , , , , , , ,

Media Digest 11/6/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   The Wall St. insider trading probe lead to another 14 arrests.

Reuters:   Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM) lost $19 billion and asked Treasury for money.

Reuters:   GM is readying its plans for Opel as some of its workers went on strike.

Reuters:   The pay czar says the jury is still out on reforms. Read More »

Posted on: November 6, 2009 – 3:58 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today’s Best Market Rumors (10/28/2009) (UBS)(SNE)(BCS)(CBS)

newspaperUpdated throughout the day.

Update 12.05 PM EST:  UBS (NYSE:UBS) may spin off PaineWebber  (Breakingviews)

GMAC has asked the Treasury Department for several billion more dollars in loans. (NYTimes)

Barry Diller’s IACI (NASDAQ:IACI) might be willing to sell its search business.  (NYPost)

News Corp (NYSE:NWS) and CBS (NYSE:CBS) are trying to get cable companies including Time Warner Cable (NYSE:TWC) to pay for carrying their broadcast channels.  (WSJ)

Statistics on ”global cooling” may be bogus.  (Ars Technica)

AMD’s (NYSE:AMD) former CEO Hector Ruiz may have leaked tips to one of the people accused of insider trading in the Galleon case.  (various)

The German hedge fund firm K1 is part of an international criminal investigation after allegedly stiffing banks including Barclays (NYSE:BCS), JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM). and BNP Paribas with $400 million of losses.  (Bloomberg)

Covance (NYSE:CVD) shares are undervalued by 50%  (BusinessWeek)

Sony (NYSE:SNE) is expected to loss money for the fourth straight quarter.  (Forbes)

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: October 28, 2009 – 9:13 am in Rumors, , , , , , , , , ,

Media Digest (10/15/2009) Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) is having trouble justifying its huge bonuses.

Reuters:   Bruce Wasserstein, M&A giant and head of Lazard (NYSE:LAZ), died.

Reuters:   Congress will probe compensation at AIG (NYSE:AIG).

Reuters:   US foreclosures fell for a second month but stayed high. Read More »

Posted on: October 15, 2009 – 4:04 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Comcast Should Buy Viacom, Time Warner, Or Scripps

TVOne of the leading media investing firms in the US, Gabelli & Co. wants cable outfit Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA) to stop its pursuit of GE’s (NYSE:GE) NBCU and turn its focus on better run media companies with stronger assets. That would include, in Gabelli’s opinion Viacom (NYSE:VIA), Time Warner (NYSE:TWX),  Scripps Interactive (NYSE:SNI)

Gabelli & Co. analyst Chris Marangi said. “Viacom has everything Comcast wants and none of what it doesn’t want.” Read More »

Posted on: October 9, 2009 – 5:47 am in Cable Companies, Old Media, , , , , ,

With $2 Billion Profit Potential GE (GE) Won’t Sell NBCU

houseGE (GE) won’t sell its NBC Universal division, at least not at the price levels that are being rumored. It is unlikely that in the current economic environment that GE could get more than $30 billion for the unit, which is now an essential part of the conglomerate’s earnings.

Rumors of  a potential deal, though, abound.  Bloomberg News is reporting that the Philadelphia-based cable company is in talks with GE about taking a 50 percent stake in NBCU.  The New York Times chimmed in saying that Comcast “was one of several companies in talks about potentially buying a stake in NBC Universal.”

There is obviously lots of spin control going on here, but GE is not a desperate seller as it might have been a few months ago.  NBCU will probably make $2 billion in profits on $14 billion in revenue this year. Those numbers will be down from last year, but still represent an acceptable performance during a recession that has decimated a great deal of the revenue opportunity in the media sector. NBC was the beneficiary of advertising for both the Olympics and the presidential election last year. Read More »

Posted on: October 1, 2009 – 5:36 am in Media, Mergers and Buy Outs, , ,

Media Digest 9/30/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NY Times, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   China celebrated 60 years of communist rule as a capitalist economy.

Reuters:   The IMF cut global debt write-offs to $3.4 trillion.

Reuters:   CIT (CIT) is close to a deal to give the company to bondholders. Read More »

Posted on: September 30, 2009 – 4:04 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Today’s Best Market Rumors (9/28/2009)

Updated regularly throughout the day.

Update: Rusal, the world’s biggest aluminum firm, may have an IPO on The Hong Kong exchange. The company is controlled by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska and has $7.4 billion in debt. (MarketWatch)

Not a rumor: Man sues Bank of America (BAC) for “1,784 billion, trillion dollars” (Reuters)

Natural gas prices could drop 19% (Bloomberg)

newspaperTime Warner (TWX) will sell its Time, Inc. magazine group (BusinessWeek).

Kraft (KFT) will up its bid for Cadbury for hostile takeover. (MarketWatch)

Market negative on Yahoo!’s (YHOO) new ad campaign creative. (reliable).

The Administration may put $35 billion  into helping state and local housing agencies. (WSJ)

CBS (CBS) may announce a deal with GlobalPost which will provide the network with overseas reporting (NYT)

Major US banks could post big improvementsin Q3 earnings if they write-up the value of toxic assets (FT).

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: September 28, 2009 – 9:07 am in Rumors, , , , , ,

News Digest 9/28/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   Solvay sold its drug unit to Abbott (ABT) foe $6.6 billion.

Reuters:   Kraft (KFT) will launch a hostile bid for Cadbury.

Reuters:   The World Bank said not to take the dollar’s role in the global economy for granted.

Reuters:   Crucell got a $302 million investment from J&J (JNJ) Read More »

Posted on: September 28, 2009 – 4:04 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , ,

Today’s Best Market Rumors (NOK)(PALM)(AAPL)(MHP)(CBS)

newspaperStrauss Zelnick, former record exec, and former WSJ publisher Gordon Crovitz will buy BusinessWeek, (MHP) which was yesterday rumored to be closing. (BW)

Nokia (NOK) will buy travel social network Dopplr for $20 million. (TechCrunch)

CBS (CBS) is not a bankruptcy candidate. (SAI)

A Financial Accounting Standards Board ruling will help Apple (AAPL) earnings, but then again, it won’t.  (WSJ)(Barron’s).

Goldman Sachs (GS) may alter compensation packages for PR reasons. (NYPost)

A new and powerful argument for why Nokia would buy Palm (PALM) (Forbes).

Autonomy, the UK search software firm, will be bought by Microsoft (MSFT). (Reuters).

Twitter could raise about $100 million at a valuation of $1 billion with the money coming from T. Rowe Price and private-equity firm Insight Venture Partners. (WSJ).

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: September 24, 2009 – 11:43 am in Media, Rumors, , , , , , ,

The Growing Trend Of Denying Rumors

balllmerMicrosoft (MSFT) felt compelled to deny a rumor that it would buy Electronic Arts (ERTS) after shares in the game company rose over 7% on speculation of a deal.

BusinessWeek had to say that it was not closing after a Twitter message to that effect leaked to the public.

Last week, and again this week, there were persistent rumors that Deutsche Telekom (DT) would buy Sprint (S) and put it together with its US cellular operation T-Mobile. The fact that the two companies run on incompatible networks did not seem to matter.

CBS (CBS) approached members of the press after stories that it might go Chapter 11 appeared based on a study by well-regarded research firm Audit Integrity. Read More »

Posted on: September 24, 2009 – 6:04 am in Media, , , , ,

Are CBS (CBS) And Sprint (S) At Risk For Bankruptcy?

bearAudit Integrity, a research firm, has come out with a list of the large American companies which are most likely to go bankrupt in the next year. The data behind the figures seem valid, but some of the companies on the list which include CBS (CBS), Sprint (S), AMD (AMD), and Sirius XM (SIRi) seem improbable candidates.

The corporate communications staffs of these companies and their outside public relation firms will tell their managements to keep quiet and not react. A reaction, they will argue, just makes it look like Audit Integrity knows what it is doing and that there is some validity to their analysis. Audit Integrity is probably counting on that. It will get a lot of exposure for the study and little ,if any, legitimate criticism.

Audit Integrity says its research services support risk management practices that help investors, insurers and others lower risk and improve performance with objective ratings and reports.

Read More »

Posted on: September 18, 2009 – 2:34 pm in Research, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fox Business Lasts Less Than Two Years

TVMSBNC, operated by the NBCU division of GE (GE) and CBS (CBS) made the mistake of throwing Don Imus off the air in April 2007. He made intemperate and distasteful comments about black women basketball players at Rutgers. It is what the old fool has been doing for years. It is hard to imagine why the two media companies expected more from him.

Imus staged a comeback by moving to WABC in New York and onto RFD TV. RFD never had any audience, so it was only a matter of time before Imus found another TV network to simulcast his radio show which runs weekday mornings during drive time and ends at 10 AM.

Fox Business, launched in October 2007 by News Corp (NWS), was never able to get any significant audience, so, after less than two years one the air, it is throwing in the towel on business programming during its most important part of the day, from 6AM to 9AM. According to The New York Times, “the Fox Business Network said Thursday that it would simulcast the “Imus in the Morning” radio show starting on Oct. 5.”

Fox Business will continue to run financial programming during the rest of the day, but having surrendered the core of its schedule, the channel is dead as a competitor to CNBC and Bloomberg TV.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted on: September 3, 2009 – 1:23 pm in Old Media, , ,

Media Digest 8/20/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   UBS (UBS) shares may fall when the Swiss government sells out.

Reuters:   The US deficit estimate was trimmed to $1.59 trillion.

Reuters:   A homeowner sued Wells Fargo (WFC) over a credit line.

Reuters:   AIG (AIG) was sued by policyholders over the Madoff fraud. Read More »

Posted on: August 20, 2009 – 3:55 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Top 10 Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades (BT, ELY, CBS, CTXS, DUK, INFY, LINTA, NZ, RIMM, VMW)

These are the top ten brokerage firm analyst upgrades and downgrades we have seen from Wall Street early this Monday morning:

BT Group (BT) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Callaway Gold (ELY) Raised to outperform at JMP Securities.
CBS Corp. (CBS) Cut to Hold at Argus.
Citrix Systems (CTXS) Cut to Underperform at Jefferies.
Duke Energy (DUK) Cut to Perform at Oppenheimer.
Infosys (INFY) Raised to Buy at Deutsche Bank.
Liberty Media (LINTA) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Netezza (NZ) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Research In Motion (RIMM) Cut to Neutral at UBS.
VMware (VMW) Cut to Underperform at Jefferies.

JON C. OGG
AUGUST 10, 2009

Posted on: August 10, 2009 – 8:08 am in Analyst Calls, , , , , , , , , ,

Media Digest 8/7/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NY Times, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   A college education no longer means easy employment in China.

Reuters:   Fannie Mae (FNM) lost $14.8 billion.

Reuters:   The auto “clunkers” legislation passed the Senate.

Reuters:   Obama is in no rush to decide Bernanke’s appointment to a new term. Read More »

Posted on: August 7, 2009 – 4:05 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

As Viacom’s (VIA) Paramount Looks For Partner It May Be Bought Out

paramountThe DVD business is bad. Video-on-demand, available on most cable systems, and internet streaming of premium content have cut into one of the largest profit centers in Hollywood.

Viacom’s (VIA) Paramount studio operation is looking for a partner for its home entertainment unit, which produces and sells DVDs, in the hope of cutting costs. The most logical marriage of that business would be to another studio which faces that same problem with eroding margins. Read More »

Posted on: July 1, 2009 – 5:07 am in Entertainment, Internet, Media, Old Media, , , , , ,

Media Digest 6/15/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

newspaperReuters:   The heads of the emerging markets, the so-called BRICs, held their first global summit.

Reuters:   Obama will be tested this week on financial reforms.

Reuters:   Rich nations are working on an exit from stimulus packages.

Reuters:   Pfizer (PFE) is trying to do deals to improve its emerging market presence. Read More »

Posted on: June 15, 2009 – 3:01 am in Press Digest, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Failure Of The Web 1.0 Giants And The Case That Facebook and MySpace Could Be Worthless

bankFacebook recently took in a new $200 million investment which puts the value of the company at $10 billion. That is down from a $15 billion valuation based on an investment that Microsoft (MSFT) made in the social network site in the fall of 2007. Most industry estimates are that Facebook will lose money on revenue of $500 million this year. News Corporation’s (NWS) purchase of MySpace and several smaller sites for $580 million in 2005 is still considered a coup, although MySpace revenue is less than $1 billion and it is losing ground to Facebook. Read More »

Posted on: June 8, 2009 – 3:53 am in Internet, Media, , , , , , , , , ,

Top Analyst Upgrades (CBS, LH, LXK, MS, ODP, PII, DGX, TLAB, WINN)

These are the few top pre-market analyst upgrades and positive research notes from Wall Street firms early this Friday morning with about two hours until the market opens:

CBS (CBS) Raised to Buy at UBS.
Laboratory Corp. (LH) Started as Outperform at RBC.
Lexmark (LXK) Raised to EqualWeight at Barclays.
Morgan Stanley (MS) Raised to Outperform at KBW.
Office Depot (ODP) raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Polaris (PII) Raised to Outperform at Baird.
Quest Diagnostics (DGX) Started as Outperform at RBC.
Tellabs (TLAB) Started as Buy at Auriga.
Winn-Dixie (WINN) Raised to Outperform at FBR.

JON C. OGG

Posted on: May 29, 2009 – 6:35 am in Analyst Calls, , , , , , , , ,