Anyone think Howie Carr might be thinking "Entercom's NOT happening."? I know I am.
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Audacy selling Boston assets
- Thread starter mets18
- Start date
The "going concern" warning was first made last fall. They've been operating under this for a long time.
Wall Street Analyst Asks If Audacy ‘Can Make It’ | Radio & Television Business Report
A contributor to TheStreet, Stockhouse and Seeking Alpha currently part of a team that oversees an outside investment manager managing almost $30 billion has authored a report that puts a very big question in the face of Audacy Corp.'s leadership team.rbr.com
Correct. That's fairly standard procedure when a publicly traded company is in a situation similar to Audacy's current predicament. I haven’t known too many broadcasting companies to just issue a statement like that and fold. I'm thinking Cumulus mentioned a similar passage in its reports several months before it filed bankruptcy.
where there's smoke there's fire . I think Audacy will sell these stations within a year ( Radio One come back to Boston ? EMF ? ) .
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Who's got the cash? Radio isn't in a position to borrow any more. Stock prices for much of radio is in the dumper.
The entire Market Cap of Audacy is: 4.4 Million.
If they sell the stations, they might be surprised at how little interest (and price) they bring.
Selling towers and sites is probably going to yeild them more now than before.
So they have over ONE BILLION in debt coming due in the next year, they have less than 90 Million in cash, the combined assets of the company are not worth much... How do they refinance a billion plus in debt with rising rates, and they are going to be sub prime rated. Ignoring FCC rules on station ownership and revenue limits, there is no existing radio company, or any company ( even EMF)that is going to buy into AUD to save them and nobody in their right mind is buying radio stations, especially ones that are a billion plus in the hole.
From the article in the OP:
They give the creditors equity in the company in exchange for postponing the due date. In the meantime, they sell assets, and attempt to create some new revenue streams. They work out a payment plan in which the creditors get something now, in exchange for more later.
Yeah that's what they tried to do with clear channel back in day how did that work out? . Oh one of the things that came out last week was that they broke a contract with American public media that had cost them some 10 million dollars in losses. Audacy takes $10 million hit to exit “onerous” podcasting deal with APM.
Any investor that thinks they're going to hang on and get a billion dollars plus back from them is out of their mind. Take the loss and use it to offset profits from other investments.
Any investor that thinks they're going to hang on and get a billion dollars plus back from them is out of their mind. Take the loss and use it to offset profits from other investments.
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Audacy just announced that they’re ending their podcast deal with American Public Media (Marketplace, Performance Today) one year in advance and will absorb $10M in losses. By all accounts, they tried to grow their podcast unit too big, too fast, and it failed to make headway with the competition.
www.theverge.com
Audacy takes $10 million hit to exit “onerous” podcasting deal with APM
American Public Media confirmed that its multiyear partnership with Audacy will end in August.
www.theverge.com
Howie always had a grudge against the company because they wouldn’t let him get out of a long-term contract with WRKO he willingly signed.
Lowry Mays took Bain Capital to the cleaners when he convinced them to buy out Clear Channel and assume $20B in debt.
But that was back in the pie in the sky days of radio where they were paying way more for stations than they should have. If I remember right that deal was delayed I would have bet that Bain capital and Lee partners were trying to get out of that deal and they couldn't... so they went forward with it even though it turned out very badly for them
Not so much the contract....but an automatic renewal of said contract he challenged.
Actually, Bain Capital and its partners in the Clear Channel deal were looking for medium size businesses that they could do leveraged buyouts on and bundle into private investor funds. They found Clear Channel was willing to talk, and they made an offer that the Mays family and "Red" liked so they sold.
When the economy declined during the approval process, Bain et. al. tried to back out, but they had no legal basis and were denied the retraction of the deal.
MassMusicMan
Banned
LOL @ losing $10 million. What's the overhead for podcasts? What factory did Audacy build? What land did they mine?
If I remember correctly, then-Entercom paid almost $70 million for Pineapple Street and Cadence 13 in 2019. Not sure how the loss on the American Public Media deal is being calculated, but the company's expansion into podcasting wasn't cheap.
MassMusicMan
Banned
I've never seen my point driven home so beautifully.
I just Googled both of those things because, well, I needed to. Pineapple Street is the sixth hit, with the first five being about an unrelated book. IDK about you, but if I were to pay eight figures for a brand, I'd expect nothing less than being at the top of the search engine results. But, hey, what did you really expect from people who thought that a misspelling of "odyssey" was better for awareness than the word "radio?"
Since I'm still curious about what compelled adults who ostensibly attended business school to pay such an eye-popping sum for an entity which, again, manufactures nothing more than digital audio files, I clicked through. First item while scrolling was this:
What do you think of when you hear "Expansive cosmic audio drama?" Do you think mass-appeal...or do you think of the most high-end, geeky, science fiction ever? There's a market there, sure...but was it worth eight figures?
Further scrolling indicates an affiliation with HBO in the form of the Succession podcast. That's a valuable property, sure...but it's also a show that got 2.9 million viewers for the series finale. I'm one of them, and I haven't (nor would I) bother listening to this podcast. Nor would anyone who didn't watch the show.
How do you make back $80 million in a window which satisfies your lenders through selling ads for an audio show about a TV show that didn't even get three million viewers? Sounds like Audacy saw the luxury brand, and decided they had to have it - not unlike some working stiff buying a high-end wristwatch or purse.
At least the podcast entity Cadence 13 was the top Google hit. First person I saw was the recognizable Stephen A. Smith.
some nutcase bought 60 MILLION of AUD debt?
radioinsight.com
5-Hour Energy Founder Expands Media Holdings Including Audacy & Cumulus Stakes
Manoj Bhargava's Bridge Media Networks has announced a series of media acquisitions including stakes in Audacy and Cumulus Media. Bhargava,
radioinsight.com
5 Hour Energy does a lot of co-branding with personalities. It'll be interesting to see how these stakes translate to branding on the radio.
some nutcase bought 60 MILLION of AUD debt?
5-Hour Energy Founder Expands Media Holdings Including Audacy & Cumulus Stakes
Manoj Bhargava's Bridge Media Networks has announced a series of media acquisitions including stakes in Audacy and Cumulus Media. Bhargava,
Manoj Bhargava has been building up a portfolio of media assets over the last few years under the radar. He's mostly gone after junk like LPTVs and he continues that trend of junk media assets with investments in Audacy, Cumulus, and The Arena Group. He's spent tons of money also on political donations that leans Republican.
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