the HOT List

On April 3, Townsquare Media said it would release its Q1 2024 results on May 9 and hold an 8am Eastern conference call. It's now known that Townsquare will be competing for analysts' attention with iHeartMedia, which has scheduled its own call at the exact same time.

“This leverages the strengths of two great companies to build something new,” said Deb McDermott, known for her role as the head of Standard Media. She will serve as Chair of MediaCo. To be clear, the $120 million transaction does not involve an asset purchase agreement ... yet.

The Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, and a colleague representing San Antonio, have sent a letter to Bob Iger, Lachlan Murdoch and David Zaslav — the respective leaders of Disney, FOX and Warner Bros. Discovery — to share their worries over "Hulu for Sports."

In Jacksonville, Fla., TEGNA brands its NBC and ABC affiliates as "First Coast News," owing to nearby St. Augustine. Both stations air shared newscasts, and have been a "duopoly" since November 1999. Now, TEGNA is asking the Commission to give it an digital-era upgrade.

S&P Global Ratings, on the second day of the 2024 NAB Show in Las Vegas, moved ahead with several rating actions on U.S. local TV broadcasters in 2024. The news is not good.

NBCUniversal-owned stations in three markets have launched personalized versions of live broadcasts. It's a capability that comes with the rollout of NEXTGEN TV.

Given his experience with transactions, born out of his ownership of an FM radio station in San Francisco in the early 1980s, what does Media Services Group Managing Director Bob Heymann have to say about the deal-making environment of today and its overall health? His assessment is hardly rosy.

The highly anticipated launch of a datacasting platform to enable data distribution across all current Sinclair TV markets where it has a NEXTGEN TV “lighthouse” with ATSC 3.0 technology arrived on Sunday morning. Introducing Broadspan, which will serve the 40% of the U.S. where Sinclair has a broadcast presence.

Spanish Broadcasting System has been handed a proposed fine from the FCC's Enforcement Bureau for the apparent failure of one of its Los Angeles radio stations to deliver a prize to a contest winner in the prescribed time the FM said it would.

A collection of the nation's top TV station owners have come together to lead "a collective venture that will revolutionize over-the-air television audience measurement." They claim it will also expedite the deployment of "innovative applications by broadcasters."

As RBR+TVBR exclusively reported on Thursday, Ralph Oakley, who led the former Quincy Media, Inc., is returning to ownership and coming out of retirement. A new LLC formed by Oakley is acquiring a Nexstar Media Group TV property. We now know who served as Nexstar's broker of record.

By April 2022, the man who led Quincy Media, Inc., was all but retired, as he was honored with a Broadcasters Foundation of America Leadership Award. Now, in a surprise, Oakley has just returned to broadcast TV station ownership. And, it is thanks to a deal with Perry Sook-led Nexstar.

Verizon FiOs has shared its thoughts with the FCC regarding a plan that would provide rebates to customers in the event local TV stations are blocked, by law, from viewing due to the lack of a retransmission consent agreement. In short, it's calling out the Commission for overstepping its authority.

Sinclair Inc. has announced when it will share with analysts, investors and the general public its first quarter 2024 financial results. What can they expect to hear from the owner of broadcast television stations, tower company Dielectric, ad sales entity Compulse, and Tennis Channel?

Pro-cable TV advocacy group ACA Connects in March expressed its disappointment in a 3-2 vote by the Commission to establish an "all-in pricing order" for the cable television industry, designed to give consumers billing clarity. Now DirecTV has shared its thoughts, and its displeased, too.