Posted on 10/23/2016 7:12:47 AM PDT by Dacula
AT&T has agreed to buy Time Warner, parent of CNN and other Atlanta-based properties of the Turner broadcasting business, for $85.4 billion, the companies announced Saturday night.
(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...
I remember the really funny ads, but not what they were selling.
CNN/Turner are not worth 1/1000th what ATT is borrowing to pay for them.
then you wonder what else is going on behind the scenes.
I know there are various ways to place a market value on any business. I don’t know how they place a value on the business entity known as Cable News Network. They probably don’t have a lot of business assets; property plant and equipment, etc. Much of their value probably comes from their being an established network with a base number of viewers, which in turn can attract advertisers to support their business. But I don’t know how to plug all that into a spreadsheet to come up with the market value of CNN.
But, to your point, if they are paying far about any reasonable market value for these networks, something else must be going on, for them to pay far more than what those business properties are worth.
Aren’t Time Warner Cable and Time Warner different corporate entities?
One piece of evidence in support of what u say is myself. After half a century of watching TV in my house, I find have zero interest in any of the 500 odd channels. I know that because I have not turned it on in two months. I can get everything I need on my several computers. I haven’t watched one minute of alphabet TV in 30 years.
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I’m where you are. I get weary of sitcoms which have been dumbed down to where some characters spout one liners and the audience roars with laughter for a minute, with reaction to some dumb one liner or gesture.
I get weary of sitcoms pushing homosexuality or other bizarre behaviors. I get weary of those same sitcoms with smart ass kids behaving badly.
Add it all up, and I watch very little TV anymore. I enjoy watching channels which have old classic sitcoms or dramas or westerns or sci fi such as Twilight Zone. Otherwise could not care less about the current prime time offerings of NBC, ABC, and CBS.
I'm not really sure. I know my son in Indianapolis has AT&T for his cable and internet, and I just assumed that AT&T would be taking over my Time Warner cable and internet from Spectrum.
That is such a high price, I won’t believe it until I see more sources.
Wow.
Never thought Democrats would ever sell CNN.
Neither was Bear Stearns.
(notable properties):
GE....Comcast, NBC, Universal Pictures, Focus Features
NEWSCORP....Fox, Wall Street Journal, New York Post
DISNEY....ABC, ESPN, Pixar, Miramax, Marvel Studios
VIACOM....MTV, Nick Jr, SET, CMT, Paramount Pictures
TIME WARNER....CNN, HBO, Time, Warner Brothers
CBS....Showtime, Smithsonian Channel, NFL COM, Jeopardy, 60 Minutes
Anti-Trust, anyone?
Leni
So why did they break up AT&T the first time if they’re just going to allow it to swallow up media again?
IIRC They already reabsorbed most of the Baby Bells.
May be true didn’t Standard oil and Ma Bell get busted for being to big and had to split up.
The way D.C. is now it’s all about who you know and how much you can pay.
The point is, and it’s not just mine, it’s a point by industry experts, is that the cable companies are going to go belly up because of the growth of streaming services.
Streaming services depend on high-speed internet which is growing at a fast rate through Fiber and Microwave transmissions. Cable companies offer fast speed internet but they cannot force an internet consumer to take a cable tv package. In fact, they piss people off to no end with their strong arm tactics to try and push people into a cable tv package.
So the future is internet streaming which means PEOPLE CAN CHOOSE WHAT THEY WANT TO SEE. There is no programming with streaming services.
It would make better sense for ATT to take the $85b that they are ‘privileged’ to borrow at 0% and launch a nationwide microwave/fiber high-speed internet for consumers at cutthroat prices.
It makes no sense to buy into cable programs that are declining and which are embedded in a cable industry that is similarly declining. Makes no sense whatsoever, not at $85b. It might make better sense at a much smaller price for the advertising alone, although it will decline, it will take a few years.
If ATT budgets $200m each year for tv advertising, and CNN/Turner ad revenues (although in decline) are on the order of $2b per year, then it makes sense to pay say at most $3b to caretake the dying dinosaur while benefitting marginally from its own advertising for a few years.
However, the out-of-touch fat dummies in the ATT boardroom who can arrange their privileged $100b credit facility via a Fed Bank member at 0%, are not cognizant of the fact that the public is swarming to social media and now hates CNN and other Turner brands. So ATT is buying hated brands and their fat dummies are not capable of turning that around.
I would advise to stand ready to short ATT over the next 2 years.
A hundred years ago, our forefathers broke up the monopolies. They had some great reasons for that. To much power in to few hands.
When dissent is not banned outright, but simply not allowed to be published or seen, some will remember that. There is no way that this merger should be allowed to happen. This will be labeled “TO BIG TO FAIL!” and propped up by the taxes of our children and grandchildren.
I see this differently. The streaming services will not be allowed to supply ala carte content very much longer. The industry will not allow it. The large production companies will start buying out the people that supply the web access to the streaming services, in not the services themselves.
Right now there is Amazon and Netflix. I would bet on a hostile take over of Netflix sooner than later. Neither of those two companies is interested in independent content that they can’t control.
Disagree that AT&T is a dinosaur.
They have vast telecom networks that have big value. And if they can buy a content company or two, they will have diversified their portfolio as Comcast has done.
Verizon is in the same boat trying to buy Yahoo.
The internet is worth nothing without the physical infrastructure underneath. And a Google or Amazon or Microsoft has no desire to manage the ugliness under the Internet Protocol layer.
Answers to your assertion:
YouTube, Vimeo, DailyMotion, ... ad infinitum.
Whatever industry you’re concern-trolling about, it is not going to take over the internet.
They have ‘vast networks’ that are fast approaching obsolescence. The content they are buying here is cable-based which is dying. The dummies in their boardroom are not sharp, not competitive. All they have is a credit hook to the Fed Reserve; that’s all they got.
Trump just said a day or two ago, that if he is President, he would NOT approve this merger, as it is monopolistic, and there will be nothing but large monopolies controlling most of the MSM (a total of about 6 of them). Watch your bills go up and up.
A lot of this is eyeballs and the ability to deliver to those eyeballs. Agree that cable alone is in trouble. The content is king, but you also need the wireless and wireline networks to deliver it.
85b for ‘content’ is complete bullsh*t.
With high probability here’s what went down.
There’s a ton of ‘free money’ right now for those with the right connections to the Fed Reserve.
CNN/Turner who are in decline look around and see a suitor ATT that can get a ton of it if they have the right approach which is a Merger-Acquisition because anything else requires real work and real innovation.
CNN/Turner can’t get the cash themselves because they suck and ATT needs a fast excuse. So they gather at a golf course and talk smack.
After ATT’s lawyers pay off themselves and other parties, ATT controls Turner and Turner has cash which is pledged back to ATT by side agreement.
Everyone swims in free money.
Got to get the cash now because Trump is going to restore reality to the money markets which means money will no longer be free. Trump said himself he would have the US Govt borrow to rebuild the military and other critical items because money is so cheap. But after awhile the era of free money will be in the rearview mirror.
That’s what we are seeing here.
85b for CNN/Turner? About as credible as a hooker saying Trump sexually assaulted her way back when.
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