Little Noticed

[jdweaver]

It will be reported in the finacial trades, but the radio trades will likely avoid mentioning that CBS took ANOTHER 9.5 Billion dollar write down on their radio & TV assets.

Combined with a larger ($18.5 Billion) write down last year, CBS has written off 41% of the value of their radio and TV holdings.

In layman's terms, it simply means CBS feels their radio and TV stations are worth HALF of what they paid for them. Other major groups have quietly done the same the past two years including Clear Channel.

So were the stations overvalued to begin with or is the real value now surfacing? <P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by jdweaver on 02/24/06 03:09 PM.</FONT></P>

 

[maybescrewed]

And the pendulum swings

Perhaps we're only a few years away from actual local people owning their City's stations again and perhaps (this is wishing, I know) there will once again be PERSONALITY on the air instead of Mister Voice Track?

 

[AQH]

Re: And the pendulum swings

Please. Do you really think that radio's woes are due to voicetracking? Seriously?

> Perhaps we're only a few years away from actual local people
> owning their City's stations again and perhaps (this is
> wishing, I know) there will once again be PERSONALITY on the
> air instead of Mister Voice Track?
>

 

[OttoM]

Re: And the pendulum swings

> Please. Do you really think that radio's woes are due to
> voicetracking? Seriously?
>

You can't blame him/her for that comment - that's to be expected from someone displaced by automation.

 

[OttoM]

> It will be reported in the finacial trades, but the radio
> trades will likely avoid mentioning that CBS took ANOTHER
> 9.5 Billion dollar write down on their radio & TV assets.


For one thing - it's $9.1 billion, not $9.5 billion. But hey - what's $400 million between friends?

>
> Combined with a larger ($18.5 Billion) write down last year,
> CBS has written off 41% of the value of their radio and TV
> holdings.
>
> In layman's terms, it simply means CBS feels their radio and
> TV stations are worth HALF of what they paid for them. Other
> major groups have quietly done the same the past two years
> including Clear Channel.

Better go back and take Accounting 101. This was a ONE TIME charge. Most likely due to the restructuring of CBS into a separate entity. It means nothing in the grand scheme of things.

>
> So were the stations overvalued to begin with or is the real
> value now surfacing?
>

Value? CBS actually reported a 3% INCREASE in earnings.

 

[maybescrewed]

That the best you can do?

I'm talking about Station A sounds like Station B sounds like Station C sounds like station D.

I was referring, in specific, to the fact that NO station has any damned PERSONALITY any more.

I was in Japan when Imus was getting himself suspended from the air on a regular basis from WMCA in New York. But I heard tapes that others brought over with them.

He was out of line in the worst of ways, but he made an impact.

Now, everything is homogonized, pasturized, and strained before it reaches the air.

As to being replaced by Prophet....best thing that ever happened to me.
I make more money, I didn't spend upwards of $5,000 just getting to and from work this year. I don't drive 63 miles each way and I only work about four hours a day....I'd never have left on my own because....well, because I thought I loved it.
I was wrong..they did me a favor and there's not been enough money printed that would EVER pursuade me to make that drive again just to be in the business if Seattle was where it had to be.

 

[TheOriginalLarry]

> It will be reported in the finacial trades, but the radio
> trades will likely avoid mentioning that CBS took ANOTHER
> 9.5 Billion dollar write down on their radio & TV assets.
>
> Combined with a larger ($18.5 Billion) write down last year,
> CBS has written off 41% of the value of their radio and TV
> holdings.
>
> In layman's terms, it simply means CBS feels their radio and
> TV stations are worth HALF of what they paid for them. Other
> major groups have quietly done the same the past two years
> including Clear Channel.
>
> So were the stations overvalued to begin with or is the real
> value now surfacing?

They were already overvalued. Then Telecom '96 happened and once all these stations were being sold, it was a question of how much you could sell a station for - actual value was an afterthought. This was the '90s and everybody had money to burn.

Today, with all kinds of competing technology and everybody bring broke, these stations actual values are being looked at. And there's a lot of CEOs banging their heads on their desks or shaking their fists to the sky and screaming "STOP IT!!"

Nope...Reagan was wrong. Greed is NOT good...not in the long run...
>
<P ID="signature">______________
"If I were in this business only for the business, I wouldn't be in this business." Samuel Goldwyn

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