Sinclair...Again

[A3N 1002]

Here some more fun news involving Sinclair. According to TVNewscheck, Sinclair is poised to buy the Fisher tv stations which include KOMO in Seattle and KATU in Portland. Also the article mentions that Sinclair is the frontrunner for the Local TV stations. Seriously, how many more stations can this group buy?! The FCC needs to step in and stop them in their tracks. Article:

http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/66787/sinclair-poised-to-buy-fisher-stations?utm_source=&utm_medium=Email&utm_term=http%3a%2f%2fwww.tvnewscheck.com%2farticle%2f66787%2fsinclair-poised-to-buy-fisher-stations&utm_campaign=Sinclair+Poised+To+Buy+Fisher+Stations

[CircleSeven 1955]

Ahh, they're going into unchartered territory now, with KOMO & KATU is concerned. SMMFH!!!! :bang:

 

If anyone checked out this TVNewsCheck article last month, Sinclair is obviously playing the "bigger-is-better" mantra. But what did I say back last November when they'd announced that Barrington was on the block, Quantity over Quality will lose every time.

 

I wouldn't care so much about many of the Fisher's CBS stations, since they'll be now a sister to KTVL in Medford. Una Vez Mas or Entravision should've snag the Univision affiliates. It's Fisher's two top ABC stations, that I'm highly concerned of. Scripps & even LIN would've been a serious fit for those two stations alone. All Sinclair will do is to lower the station standards almost like the way their other stations are.

 

This is some sad news indeed.

[TennTV1983 804]

It will definitely be a dark day in the Pacific Northwest if Fisher goes through with the sale of its stations to Sinclair.

 

The FCC needs to drop the hammer on this madness ... and soon.

[tyrannical bastard 3951]

I wonder what Newport will do with KMTR now....keep them, sell them to Fisher, or sell it directly to Sinclair....

 

I never thought I would see the day that Sinclair would be a potential owner of WJW in Cleveland. Once all the sales are done, they'll have a station in every major market in Ohio (except for Youngstown).

 

B&C did a top 25 of the groups, and just with the Cox & Barrington acquisitions, they'd be at 30%. Adding Fisher and LocalTV will surely put them over 39.5% (if that rule even applies anymore)

 

...and the more I think about the possibility of Sinclair buying LocalTV outright....there would have to be divestitures and/or swaps. Could they actually get their hands on WTVR again? (since they were shot down 5 years ago when Raycom was forced to divest them when they bought J-P and WWBT).

Maybe Media General would make a play at buying or swapping for WTVR since they're free of newspapers and can finally own a station in their home market!

 

This could get interesting....either Sinclair is about to buy a whole lot of stations, or a LOT of stations are about to get new owners (by swapping and trading)!

[ABC 7 Denver 1715]

Oh F*ck monkeys! If Sinclair bought Local TV, that would mean that 2 of the three FOX affiliates in Colorado would be owned by Sinisterclair! I'm guessing that the news department from both stations would be cut and that KXRM would become a satellite of KDVR.

 

WHAT HAS THE WORLD COME TO???

[bhratbrat 437]

Hopefully fisher has the sense to keep komo and katu at least.

[skbl17 188]

MADNESS!! Absolute madness! Sinclair is like an uncontrollable monster! At this rate, eventually the day will come when Sinclair (and maybe Nexstar) gain a practical duopoly on private OTA broadcasting in the US; then they merge to create a colossus of truly gargantuan, anti-competitive, monopolistic proportions!

 

Ownership limits? What ownership limits? When this is over there probably won't be any kind of point in having ownership limits, as Sinclair will probably just pass ownership of its stations to its "front companies", as it's done in the past (Cunningham, anyone?).

 

I PINE for the day the FCC/DOJ forces a Sinclair breakup! (If that ever happens, that is!)

 

:rant:

[tw-804 192]

Also the article mentions that Sinclair is the frontrunner for the Local TV stations. Seriously, how many more stations can this group buy?!

 

*shudders*

 

Oh, no. If it does happen and WTVR becomes WRLH's sister station, WWBT can kiss their 10pm newscast (they produced it since 1994) and the new 7am newscast on WRLH (they produced it since 2012) goodbye. That would mean Sinclair will finally get the South's First Television Station. Remember, Sinclair announced its agreement to buy WTVR and sell WRLH back in 2008, but the US Department of Justice denied Raycom permission to sell WTVR to Sinclair. Raycom owns WWBT.

 

I'm also afraid what will happen to WTKR/WGNT in Hampton Roads. And what about WTVZ?!

 

UPDATE (11:23pm): And it looks like tyrannical bastard beat me to it.

[TheOneManHerd 553]

So, how long will it be before Sinclair starts looking into buying a whole network? Sumner Redstone can't live forever.

 

You say jump, they say 'how high?'. Local TV to Sinclair now sounds like an inevitability. With this KOMO thing, they have crossed the rubicon. No station, or station group, is too big, too expensive, or too respected for SBG to get their hands on.

[ABC 7 Denver 1715]

So, how long will it be before Sinclair starts looking into buying a whole network? Sumner Redstone can't live forever.

 

You say jump, they say 'how high?'. Local TV to Sinclair now sounds like an inevitability. With this KOMO thing, they have crossed the rubicon. No station, or station group, is too big, too expensive, or too respected for SBG to get their hands on.

-> And completely trash.

[PTVNews 194]

As a longtime resident of Portland, I've been proud of (most) of the owners of Portland TV stations. Fisher has been good to KATU as they've been semi-local and seemed to care personally about the station. I don't follow Sinclair too much but from the few things I remember, they're not good. I hope this doesn't happen.

 

It would have been interesting if Lin won the bid as they just acquired KOIN in the past year. In Portland, there hasn't been 2 major stations owned by the same company as far as I can remember. So, I don't know how that would play out.

 

It would be nice if Fisher kept KOMO and KATU but really, what is the point? It looks like Fisher might want to get out of the TV business for good. Several years ago there were rumors they were about to.

 

I feel like I should know more about station ownership groups, both large and small since I've mostly payed attention to owners of stations in Portland. Does anyone know of a good resource for this?

[montevallomatt 0]

$3 Billion in debt... I don't think I'd worry about Sinclair for too much longer. How are they going to handle all of that debt? Just give it some time and all of this binge buying will catch up with Sinclair.

[Pavelsauce 12]

This is a question I've been wanting to ask here for a while: What do people on this board have against Sinclair and Nexstar? Fromm the complaints I've seen, it seems like they're prone to mismanagement of stations, but I'm sure there's more. Can anyone chime in?

[CircleSeven 1955]

TVNewsCheck posted within the hour that it is a done deal. $373 million deal! Deai is expected to close during the third quarter, pending FCC and antitrust approval. A dark day in the NW indeed.

[susquvalleywgal 517]

http://radioinsight.com/blog/headlines/81625/sinclair-broadcasting-acquires-fisher-communications/

 

Here is even more information ... Looks like this deal also includes RADIO STATIONS, which will be the first to join the hoard of properties since 2000. Guess SinCrap knows no bound when it comes to being greedy.

 

This is sad.

 

-- Matt

[T.L. Hughes 890]

$3 Billion in debt... I don't think I'd worry about Sinclair for too much longer. How are they going to handle all of that debt? Just give it some time and all of this binge buying will catch up with Sinclair.

Is there a source regarding the debt amount?

[Pavelsauce 12]

From what I've read in the list of Fisher stations in the TVNewsCheck article and the list of existing Sinclair stations, it looks like Sinclair would be acquiring its first Univision stations. They already have two other Spanish stations, KEYE-TV in Austin (Telemundo on DT2; CBS is the main affiliation) and WWHB-CA in West Palm Beach (Azteca América).

[bammy9 26]

Is there a source regarding the debt amount?

Yes, right here. You're probably not going to believe this (if they get the loan they want)

Sinclair is seeking $1 billion in loans, the company said today in statement distributed by PR Newswire. The financing includes a $500 million term loan A expiring in April 2018, a $400 million term portion B that comes due in April 2020 and a $100 million revolving line of credit that will mature in April 2018, according to the statement.

[bhratbrat 437]

https://esupport.fcc.gov/ccmsforms/form2000.action?form_type=2000E

 

If we want to do something, than lets do something about it. There is the complaint form right there.

[TheRob 937]

I'm sad to see we're still being floated for future Sinclair ownership. But I must admit no one has visited the stations yet, and as far as I know, Local TV hasn't circulated the books to anyone yet.

 

That's too bad for KOMO-TV and KATU, unless Sinclair is using them as trade bait for smaller market stations. It looks like Fisher had some investors who wanted to get paid. The board thwarted a hostile takeover a few years ago.

[bhratbrat 437]

Sad to see indeed. But thats why I posted the link for the FCC to actually take a look into Sinclair because I have a real concern that they don't have the resources for continued success in the markets they are trying to take over.

[CircleSeven 1955]

That's too bad for KOMO-TV and KATU, unless Sinclair is using them as trade bait for smaller market stations. It looks like Fisher had some investors who wanted to get paid. The board thwarted a hostile takeover a few years ago.

Well if you look at the Sinclair press release:

Under the terms of the agreement, Fisher shareholders will receive $41.00 in cash for each share of Fisher common stock they own. The transaction represents a 44% premium to the closing price of Fisher common stock on January 9, 2013, the final trading day prior to Fisher announcing a review of strategic alternatives.

That's exactly what they're banking on.

[T.L. Hughes 890]

I'm sad to see we're still being floated for future Sinclair ownership. But I must admit no one has visited the stations yet, and as far as I know, Local TV hasn't circulated the books to anyone yet.

 

That's too bad for KOMO-TV and KATU, unless Sinclair is using them as trade bait for smaller market stations. It looks like Fisher had some investors who wanted to get paid. The board thwarted a hostile takeover a few years ago.

Considering that Sinclair owns or operates stations in San Antonio, Baltimore, Milwaukee, Nashville and Minneapolis (all within the Top 40 U.S. media markets), I'm not sure if they'll trade KOMO, KATU or their Univision-affiliated sisters... But we'll wait and see.

 

It doesn't make sense that Sinclair is willing to buy stations without sending anyone to look at each station's operations first. Here in Oklahoma City, a Sinclair purchase of Local TV would be complicated considering they already own KOKH and KOCB. By adding KFOR-KAUT to the mix, one of the duopolies would have to be transferred to Cunningham or Deerfield, or traded to someone else. Sinclair has been slow in transitioning KOKH's newscasts to HD, which makes me wonder if the company would keep that station's news department separate here, considering the claim that it is keeping the operations of its newer Big Four acquisitions separate from one another.

 

I actually filed a complaint form at the FCC link shown in post #19 about it, it just doesn't seem right that Sinclair (and Nexstar, for that matter) can get away with controlling a large share of a single media market. Having one company control several stations makes sense in radio, but not at all in television considering the smaller station ratio between TV and radio in most markets. As I suggested in the form, the FCC should switch the amount of TV station ownership across the U.S. by one company from the current market reach percentage to a numerical limit (say 35 to 50 stations, instead of the current 39% cap) and disallow companies operating more than two TV stations in a single market.

 

Plain and simple, the fact that Sinclair and Nexstar are buying as much as they are, risking the existence of the companies by allocating more and more debt with each purchase, skirting the goverment's own rules on TV station ownership and ignoring the FCC's plans to diversify broadcast TV station ownership, makes their management either the smartest dumb people or dumbest smart people that ever lived.

[T.L. Hughes 890]

I stumbled upon this story, related to the deal:

Glancy Binkow & Goldberg LLP announces that it is investigating potential claims against the Board of Directors of Fisher Communications, Inc. (“Fisher” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ:FSCI) related

to the proposed acquisition of the Company by Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. The transaction is valued at approximately $373.3 million, or $41 per share.

 

This investigation concerns whether the Board of Directors of Fisher breached their fiduciary duties to stockholders by failing to adequately shop the Company before agreeing to enter into the

proposed transaction, and whether the Company has disclosed all material information to shareholders about the transaction.

 

[MidwestTV 1232]

Here some more fun news involving Sinclair. According to TVNewscheck, Sinclair is poised to buy the Fisher tv stations which include KOMO in Seattle and KATU in Portland. Also the article mentions that Sinclair is the frontrunner for the Local TV stations. Seriously, how many more stations can this group buy?! The FCC needs to step in and stop them in their tracks. Article:

http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/66787/sinclair-poised-to-buy-fisher-stations?utm_source=&utm_medium=Email&utm_term=http%3a%2f%2fwww.tvnewscheck.com%2farticle%2f66787%2fsinclair-poised-to-buy-fisher-stations&utm_campaign=Sinclair+Poised+To+Buy+Fisher+Stations

 

NO! NOT LOCAL TV! WDAF AND KMOV WILL BE DESTROYED UNDER THEIR LEADERSHIP!