The comedian and writer talks about his new album, political comedy and a reunion of Spinal Tap
Clear Channel and its prospective private equity buyers finally reached an agreement with their banks to finance the deal Wednesday. Now, all that stands in the way is the approval of the radio conglomerate's shareholders.
Even as Clear Channel's day in court draws near, the broadcast and advertising conglomerate's $20 billion privatization deal appears less and less likely.
As Clear Channel limps away from what looks more and more like a failed attempt to sell itself, prospects for the nation's largest radio broadcaster - not unlike most media companies - look grim.
The sale of Clear Channel Communications, America's biggest radio station owner, has rambled and lurched along like some kind of pre-Wright Brothers flying machine - a bicycle with flaps trying to get off the ground. At every step of the sale process that began when a deal was struck in November 2006, there has been turbulence. Just last month, Clear Channel settled a dispute with private equity firm Providence Capital to complete the purchase of its TV businesses.
An up and down day on Wall Street ended decidedly down Thursday, as investors demonstrated concern about shaky news from the financial and tech sectors.
U.S. stock futures pointed to a mixed open at the start of trading Thursday as investors weighed disappointing results from tech bellwether Oracle and awaited a reading on economic growth and comments from two Federal Reserve governors.
Clear Channel Communications Inc. and the private equity firms seeking to close a $19.5 billion purchase of the company on Wednesday sued the banks backing the deal.
If you've been pessimistic about the stock market, you would think you'd have plenty of reasons to gloat today.
Clear Channel's long-awaited $19 billion sale to private equity firms Bain Capital and Thomas H. Lee Partners is in danger of falling through, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The sale of local television stations at the center of a dispute between Clear Channel Communications Inc. and Providence Equity Partners, has been settled, a person close to the situation is quoted in a Wall Street Journal story today.
Clear Channel Communications Inc. shareholders approved on Tuesday a $19.5 billion buyout of the nation's biggest radio station operator, more than 10 months after the deal was proposed.
updated: Tue Sep 25 2007 00:04:00
A teen's family is suing Virgin Mobile for using her picture, posted on Flickr.com, in an ad campaign.
After several delays, a shareholder vote is imminent on a proposed $19.5-billion buyout of radio giant Clear Channel Communications.
Clear Channel has approved a revised merger bid of $20 billion from a private-equity group, the radio conglomerate said Friday.
Clear Channel pushed back a shareholder vote on a proposed $19.4 billion buyout of the company on Monday, saying it was in talks with private equity bidders regarding a revised bid.
The buyout deals keep on coming, a sign of just how white-hot the market is for mergers and acquisitions.
The following are some of Friday's most actively traded stocks:
Shareholders may have muscled the private equity suitors pursuing Clear Channel into raising their offer for the radio station giant once, but don't expect it to happen again.
Google has agreed to sell advertising on all of the stations owned by Clear Channel Communications beginning at the end of June, according to a published report.
Two private equity firms seeking to acquire No. 1 radio station operator Clear Channel Communications Inc. have agreed to raise their $26 billion bid in an effort to convince reluctant shareholders to approve the deal, according to a published report.
It's not enough to have your customers' eyes and ears--now you need to attract their noses too. This month, 100 gas stations in California will be trying technology that wafts coffee aroma at the p...
As private equity comes under closer public scrutiny, corporate boards agreeing to buyouts are increasingly looking for ways to ward off shareholder criticism.
A funny thing has happened in the world of radio. Satellite radio companies were supposed to put terrestrial radio operators out of business.
If someone asked you to name the hottest areas in media and advertising today, odds are the billboard industry would not be at the tip of your tongue.
With buyout firms raising record amounts of cash and taking companies private at a frenetic pace, the once clubby world of private equity is getting thrust into the public spotlight - and a backlash is brewing.
Here are some shares that were particularly active in late trading Thursday:
A proposed major airline deal could help stocks gain altitude in the early going Wednesday.
XM Satellite stock jumped Monday after the No. 1 satellite radio company sharply cut its losses in the most recent quarter.
Media companies are notorious for their copycat ways.
MARKETS: It's over. I say the Fall rally is kaputsky. Last week, we set a record every day but Friday. Friday was down. Monday will likely be down too after the weak GDP report and weak housing report late last week. Japan plunged too. Bye, bye.
XM Satellite Radio has crashed and burned and now some are starting to wonder if the company could be a takeover target. Shares have plummeted more than 60 percent this year.
May was a cruel month, as inflation fears battered share prices. Ten of the Sivy 70 were down more than 10% as of May 24. The worst losers: Aetna and UnitedHealth Group, the former sandbagged by ri...
Spanish language broadcaster Univision is "muy caliente" on Wall Street these days.
[HIT] The power of positive pricing. While U.S. automakers were busy sacrificing profit margins for sales volume in June and July with their employee discount programs, Honda stuck with its sticker...
Consumers are increasingly frustrated by all the commercials they have to sit through when listening to the radio or watching TV and the ads they have to wade through when reading a magazine or newspaper.
In 2002, Cincinnati's WCPO-TV was a ratings blip; now it's the No. 3 ABC affiliate in the nation. One big reason? A digital billboard on a local freeway. In a groundbreaking trial with Lamar Advert...
Satellite providers are making inroads ...
Walt Disney Co. is weighing getting out of the traditional radio business, according to a published report.
Smaller rivals have long characterized Clear Channel Communications as a bully (see "Rough on Rivals" in April's "Heavy Metal" on fsb.com). Now one little company has proved its case in court. Bols...
After striking a low note last year, the concert business is poised to sing.
Clear Channel has long been accused of using its size, success, and political clout to the detriment of small competitors. The company's critics aren't hard to find. Online tirades pop up on websit...
It's Saturday night in Billings, where 8,000 fans pack the MetraPark Arena for the Night of Destruction, an extravaganza of motorized mayhem on a hockey rink covered in 65 truckloads of dirt. The f...
For most companies that make money from the music business, the past year has been one big party on Wall Street.
A year ago, Pittsburgh radio station WXDX-FM was near the top of its game on weekday mornings. Today it's fighting hard for listeners.
The king of concerts in 2004 turned out to be a prince.
It's well known that deeply depressed stocks often enjoy a rally as the year comes to a close. This used to be called the "January effect," but the phenomenon has occurred as early as November in recent years.
The defection of Howard Stern, radio's biggest star, from Infinity Broadcasting to Sirius Satellite Radio may be remembered as the moment when a new medium crawled out of its chrysalis. It is also ...
If there were doubts about satellite radio's mass appeal, this year they disappeared. In January a mere 1.6 million people pulled down music and other entertainment from the sky. But by year's end,...
A liberal advocacy group reached an agreement Thursday with Clear Channel Communications that will allow an anti-war billboard to go up in New York's Times Square in time for the Republican National Convention.
A liberal organization filed a federal suit Monday against Clear Channel Communications alleging breach of contract for its rejection of a billboard that would have placed an anti-war message in Times Square.
Anti-war group Project Billboard has threatened to file a lawsuit Monday against Clear Channel Communications, alleging that the media company has blocked a billboard opposing the Iraq war from being mounted in Times Square, according to the New York Times.
Howard Stern is looking expensive these days. His employer, Infinity Broadcasting Corp., is reportedly facing a whopping $1.5 million fine for an episode on Stern's morning radio program that included sexual references that government watchdogs say crossed the line.
Radio host Howard Stern took aim at the Bush administration, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and media giant Clear Channel as he announced Wednesday that his program will soon be broadcast on nine new stations across the country.
Shock jock Howard Stern, under pressure for broadcasts termed by some as indecent, said Wednesday he will not leave over-the-air radio for satellite and that his show will air in nine more markets.
The summer concert season is looking a bit sickly these days, and not just because Britney Spears has a bum knee.
Clear Channel Communications Inc., the biggest owner of U.S. radio stations, agreed Wednesday to pay a $1.75 million fine to settle indecency complaints related to shock jocks such as Howard Stern.
U.S. stocks looked to open lower Wednesday as investors didn't appear quite ready to reaffirm the bullishness in the first half of the trading week.
Clear Channel Communications disclosed Tuesday that Chairman and CEO Lowry Mays was hospitalized for brain surgery Friday.
Indecency is out! The FCC hit aging shock jock Howard Stern with nearly $500,000 in fines, prompting Clear Channel to remove his show from six stations. And Victoria's Secret is scrapping its TV fa...
He's got the money, new fame from his hit reality TV show, and now Donald Trump is getting a wife.
Among Monday's earnings announcements were contrary results from Gannett and the New York Times. Gannett, the publisher of USA Today, reported a 10 percent gain in first-quarter results, while the Times' profits fell 15 percent.
Howard Stern was permanently booted Thursday from six stations owned by Clear Channel Communications, the nation's largest radio chain, after the Federal Communications Commission announced that it would impose a $495,000 fine on the company for indecent content aired on his show.
Indecent material broadcast on Howard Stern's radio show may cost six Clear Channel stations a total of $495,000, the Federal Communication Commission said Thursday, prompting the radio chain to drop Stern's show from six stations.
Will the self-proclaimed King of All Media help bring satellite radio from the fringes to the mainstream?
In front of a Macy's entrance at the Westfield Shoppingtown in Paramus, N.J., Sally Russell, a 40-something shopper with bags in one hand and coffee in the other, looks ready to drop.
Clear channel, the 1,225-station radio behemoth, isn't usually considered a friend to small businesses. But at least one, Grand Management of St. Paul, loves it. The restaurant group, with $40 mill...
In front of a Macy's entrance at the Westfield Shoppingtown in Paramus, N.J., Sally Russell, a 40-something shopper with bags in one hand and coffee in the other, looks ready to drop. She plops dow...
From Wolf Blitzer Reports' Jennifer Coggiola in Washington:
As Congress and the FCC turn up the heat on obscenity and indecency on the air, investors have to ask if defanging radio shock jocks will produce a shock to broadcasters' bottom line.
I generally dislike Clear Channel for their too-tight control of live entertainment, but I nonetheless like to get e-mails from the company because they tell me about concerts I may want to attend.
Shares of Sirius Satellite Radio rallied again Tuesday afternoon, topped the Nasdaq most active list amid speculation that companies may be looking to take a stake in the subscription radio firm.
Summer concerts are a blast, but waiting in line to score tickets--and shelling out megabucks--isn't. So Clear Channel Entertainment, which sells 70% of all summer concert tickets in the U.S. and o...
ECONOMY Look Who's Hiring
Which big corporations will take the fall for the nightclub fire in West Warwick, R.I., where almost 100 people died? The club burned down in February after a pyrotechnic display by the band Great...
Lowry Mays is the Big Daddy of radio. The founder and CEO of Clear Channel, Mays oversees 1,233 radio stations with some 100 million listeners across all 50 states, and runs a company with $8 billi...
There's the standard path to media moguldom (buy a network, amass a stable of magazines). Then there's the route the Decaux family took. Build a lot of bus shelters and self-cleaning public toilets...
Jesse Morreale was gearing up for the Van's Warped Tour, a punk-rock concert that appeared in Denver last summer. Morreale's 25-person company, Nobody in Particular Presents (NIPP), had been promot...
Jesse Morreale was gearing up for the Van's Warped Tour, a punk-rock concert that appeared in Denver last summer. Morreale's 25-person company, Nobody In Particular Presents (NIPP), had been promot...
While TV networks broadcast round-the-clock coverage of the terrorist attacks, some radio stations reportedly took a different approach: pruning their play lists. Shortly after Sept. 11, radio stat...
One month ago, Sirius Satellite Radio launched its third satellite into space from the Soviet Union's once secret Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. As any space historian knows, Baikonur is where ...
FINANCIAL INDUSTRY Merging with Travelers doesn't hurt Citicorp, which as Citigroup is No. 1 in money center banks. Newly public Goldman Sachs lands at second in securities.
Is there anything that screams old media more than radio? Radio is like Norman Rockwell sitting in front of a big brown box with his pipe and a dog. Admit it, if someone had told you to buy radio s...
Meteorologists blame the insufferable heat in San Antonio this summer on a stalled high-pressure system, yet there's another possible source of the torridity, in a modest office park north of town....
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