Posted on 02/16/2006 2:06:45 PM PST by iPod Shuffle
| Washington Business Journal - February 16, 2006 http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2006/02/13/daily20.html |
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XM Satellite Radio reported sales increases and much higher losses for the fourth quarter several days after director Pierce Roberts Jr. resigned and warned of a "crisis."
The D.C. company's stock price fell 5 percent, or by $1.27, to close at $23.98 Thursday.
The broadcaster generated fourth-quarter sales of $177.1 million, compared with $83.1 million a year earlier and 2005 sales of $558.3 million, compared with $244.4 million in 2004.
Losses widened in the fourth quarter to $268.3 million from $188.2 million in the same period a year earlier. Full-year losses rose to $666.7 million from $642.4 million in 2004.
Roberts said he had raised concerns "in an increasingly vociferous manner" to senior executives without effect.
"There is, in my view, a significant chance of a crisis on the horizon. Even absent a crisis, I believe that XM will inevitably serve its shareholders poorly without major changes now," he wrote in a Feb. 13 resignation letter that the company released Thursday in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
XM (NASDAQ: XMSR) said in its filing that it believes the disagreement with Roberts primarily relates to differences over the strategic balance between growth and profitability. The company said Roberts had argued for lower marketing, programing and promotional expenditures for several years now.
The company reported that customer acquisition costs increased slightly to $64 in 2005 from $62 the year before.
XM finished 2005 with 5.9 million subscribers, having added 898,000 new subs in the fourth quarter, and surpassed the 6 million subscriber mark in the first week of January. XM added more than 2.7 million subscribers in 2005.
The company projects subscription revenue of more than $860 million in 2006, or an almost 55 percent increase. The company said it would achieve positive cash flow from operations by the end of 2006. The broadcaster ended 2005 with $711 million in cash and cash equivalents.
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All music all the time is a red flag for drivers.
Puts you to sleep. So you gotta have those commercials.
Better yet, find a good talk radio program and let it get your blood boiling. That's far better than coffee for keeping you wide awake!
I occasionally listen to music, comedy and the 'old-tyme-radio' channels, but primarily I got XM for News...
I spend a lot of time in remote areas, and on the rare occasion I can get ANY AM or FM reception at all during the day, it is music that I can't stand and if there is any news at all, it is super left wing nonsense like NPR.....
Either that or one of the Mexican stations blasting out a half million watts of 'La Cucaracha'.
So, I'd be 'lost' without XM. And though FOX news has gone leftwards, It is still the only news station that doesn't constantly make my blood boil, so I hope that XM will survive and that they will continue to carry FOX.
1000 shares of sirius @ 5.30 Yessss I'm going on a nice ride-You can't gt on there - but close by-see you all @ 25.00
I subscribe to XM for classical music and the Tony Snow show. This is why I chose XM over Sirius.
If you live in a city with choices on radio, you can't understand what a treat satellite radio is.
The talent and future is with AM radio not satellite where you pay to listen to filth from Stern or the politically, inept Oprah holding court over clueless women. The goods are with AM.
I think you can get a lot of it for free on internet broadcasts.
"Stern was given $500M....a typical sat subscriber is thought to be worth about $500 total to the company....if Stern brings in 1M new subs, then his contract is paid for."
"All in all, not that bad of a deal for SIRI (if, that is, they can keep from going BK)."
?? they do all of this to break even ?
Their stock almost hit 8 in Dec before he started broadcasting with them, now it's under 6 .
My father bought XMSR when it was announced as an IPO. Sold it two months ago and made out quite well.
DISH Network offers Sirius Satellite's free music channels. Much better variety and selection than the Muzak channels they've had for years.
WHO-AM in Des Moines, Iowa (one of those blowtorches you can hear practically anywhere in the US at night) is broadcasting in both analog and digital AM. Digital AM receivers will set you back a few thousand dollars though.
The selection here is pretty bad too near the US/Canada border in Montana. No good talk radio (unless you're a left-winged moron and can stand CBC or one of the Canadian talk radio stations), one FM station (hay-bailin' country, local-yokel rotgut), and the rest of the stations are on AM (again hay-bailin' country, local-yokel rotgut).
So, between my MP3 collection, online radio, and Sirius Satellite Radio on DISH Network, I seem to be fairing quite well.
Why pay for something that is free? If I want to listen to commercial-free music, I play a CD, CDrw, MP3, i-Pod, or tape.
Now that is funny.
IMHO, they are wasting $55,000,000 on Oprah. We have enough whiny, maudlin, Tragedy TV -- now we have Tragedy Radio. Isn't crying while driving risky?
That's because XM raised its rates in 2005. If they raise them again to pay for Oprah, I'm bailing out.
Siris was way behind XM and losing ground before they hired Stern. Stern helped turned Sirius around and now is surpassing XM in subscriber growth. Sirius was headed towards penny stockland without Stern. It takes about an extra 650K subs pay for Howard's contract. Has Howard alone counted towards 650K extra subs? Probably not quite, but he has made Sirius a serious competitor.
I agree. Housewives can get their fill of Oprah on TV and in her magazine. Oprah is not a proven draw on the radio, and her TV popularity may not cross over on the radio. Just look at O'Reilly, who is king on TV but struggles on the radio. Having Stern exclusively is why he is kind of worth it and Oprah is not. Where XM is smart is inking the deal with Fox News. Sirius needs to do the same.
Yeah, I agree. I hadn't heard of that Opra deal until earlier in this thread. But at least they aren't wasting quite as much money on her as Sirius is on Stern.
Couldn't force me to listen to either one of them. As far as I'm concerned, they both pander to, glorify and attempt to make acceptable the very dregs of society. Oprah isn't as juvenile, but she makes up for that by being totally PC.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1580422
Loss of 23 cents per share.
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