Media Beat, Dec. 02, 2021

By David Farrell

Shaw Communications is too risky, this portfolio manager says

Whether or not the deal with Rogers goes through, Canadian telecom provider Shaw Communications is too much of a risk, says John Zechner of J. Zechner Associates, who argues that investors should have some of the telcos in their portfolios, just not Shaw at this point in time.

“When Shaw was trading at $36 [after the merger was announced], the upside was ten percent and the downside if something negative happens with the deal, I thought, would be it’ll be back in the low $20s or mid $20s against. So, on a risk/reward basis I thought I’d rather shift to Rogers which if the deal didn’t go through, there certainly wasn’t the same downside,” said Zechner, speaking on BNN Bloomberg on Monday. – Jayson MacLean, CanTech Letter

What Rogers says

With Rogers and Shaw together, thousands of new jobs will be created and ties with communities across western Canada will continue to grow stronger. The new company would create more than 3,000 new jobs, growing the combined team to more than 10,000 people strong across Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

At the centre of it all, a western head office will remain in Calgary. Rogers will also enhance Shaw’s charitable work, including the creation of more youth scholarships. The Shaw Charity Classic will continue for at least the next decade, which has already raised more than $61 million for Alberta kids’ charities. – Company website

Eric Boyko has just spent $1.4N buying 25% more Stingray Group shares

The recent purchase by Eric Boyko was the biggest purchase of Stingray Group shares made by an insider individual in the last twelve months, according to our records. That implies that an insider found the current price of CA$7.47 per share to be enticing. While their view may have changed since the purchase was made, this does at least suggest they have had confidence in the company's future. We do always like to see insider buying, but it is worth noting if those purchases were made at well below today's share price, as the discount to value may have narrowed with the rising price. The good news for Stingray Group share holders is that insiders were buying at near the current price. – Inside Wall Street

Commercial Radio Australia cleared to bargain with Google and Facebook

CRA represents 261-member radio stations across metropolitan and regional Australia, including ARN, Southern Cross Austereo, Nova Entertainment, Grant Broadcasters and Nine Entertainment. The authorisation excludes Nine, which previously announced it has reached agreements with Google and Facebook. – Mediaweek

EU plans media act, industry chief Breton says, amid curbs on freedom

The European Commission plans to introduce rules next year to prevent a few large media groups from acquiring smaller rivals and to thwart government interference, EU industry chief Thierry Breton said on Monday.

The move by the EU executive comes amid curbs on media freedom in Poland, Hungary and Slovenia and worries that the channeling of state advertising to pro-government outlets leads to indirect political influence over the media. – Foo Yun Chee, Reuters

Can commercial radio and podcasting go hand in hand

The latest UK radio audience figures from Rajar demonstrated that two-thirds of audiences now listen to radio on digital devices. DAB accounts for 43% of that total, while online and in-app makes up 18%. That means that almost a fifth of all radio listenership occurs on devices such as phones or desktop devices. Those platforms are format agnostic and audiences are just as likely to listen to non-radio audio – if they even make a distinction.

It’s an acknowledgement that the audio space is colliding, with the lines between radio content, podcasts, audiobooks and more being erased by user habit. As a result, there is a huge commercial opportunity to reach audiences that consume ‘audio’ more widely on those devices.

Podcast company Acast saw a 51% increase in listeners across its network in 2020 in addition to a 250% increase in revenue from branded content in 2020. Its UK head of sales Josh Woodhouse believes that is due in large part to an influx of new genres into the podcasting space – which in turn is attracting radio producers to launch commercial podcasts. – Chris Sutcliffe, The Drum

UK newspapers accepted money to publish positive environmental stories about Saudi Arabia around COP26

The Independent and Evening Standard newspapers have been accused of greenwashing after they accepted an undisclosed sum of money from Saudi Arabia to publish dozens of positive environmental stories about the country before, during, and after the COP26 UN climate change summit in Glasgow.

In the days preceding the summit and during its initial days, the Independent published at least 50 stories and videos under a commercial deal with Saudi Arabia, an investigation by Byline Times can reveal. – Byline Times team

Physicists, The Milky Way Is likely full of dead alien civilizations

Researchers used computer simulations to show just how likely it is that our galaxy is teeming with dead alien civilizations. The study, which was carried out by researchers at the University of Rochester in New York, showed that if just one civilization in the Milky Way were to become extinct every 100 million years, then it’s highly likely that 20 million civilizations have come and gone in our galaxy. But, if civilizations are becoming extinct every 10 million years, then it’s likely that only one civilization has ever existed in the Milky Way. – Call Me V