Business

X, formerly known as Twitter, has lost over 71% of its value since April 2022, when Elon Musk bought the microblogging app, according to mutual fund Fidelity, a shareholder in X Holdings. Fidelity — which contributed over $300 million to Elon Musk’s $44 billion takeover — originally marked down the company’s valuation in October, which decreased the value of its investment by nearly 65% over the first 11 months of Musk’s ownership.

The plaintiff, suing as a Jane Doe, claims she was assaulted by former VP of Distribution Nolan Gonzales and that management refused to escalate concerns to human resources despite complaints from other women.

If you want to buy a DVD or Blu-ray at Best Buy, you’ll soon be out of luck. The box store chain has reportedly begun to remove physical media and displays from its store shelves, according to reports on X, formerly Twitter. The social media posts come after Best Buy’s October confirmation that it would stop selling physical media in the first quarter of 2024. The decision was made in response to the mass audience migration to streaming services and digital downloads.

Wall Street slumped Wednesday as its weak start to 2024 carried into another day. Some of last year’s biggest winners again gave back some of their gains to weigh on the market. Tesla fell 4% after more than doubling last year, for example. It and the other six “Magnificent 7” Big Tech stocks responsible for the majority of Wall Street’s returns last year have regressed some following their tremendous runs.

Tegna is the largest independent owner of NBC affiliates. The 20 markets renewed cover more than 21 million households, nearly 17% of U.S. TV households.

The agreement covers 89 Nexstar-owned stations across the U.S. and its NewsNation national cable news network.

Independent credit ratings service S&P Global Ratings kicked 2024’s advertising outlook off on a stronger-than-expected note, issuing a forecast that U.S. ad spending will rise 7.6% — nearly two percentage points greater than the most recent agency holding company composite, which projects a U.S. growth rate of 5.8%. Interestingly, S&P’s outlook is even more bullish than the most optimistic holding company forecasting unit — IPG Mediabrands’ 7.2% U.S. ad-growth projection.

Fiesta, Dia De Los Muertos, and the Spur’s Wemby (Victor Wembanyama) give the South Central Texas market reasons to celebrate. Pictured: KSAT anchors David Sears and Myra Arthur deliver the news from San Antonio’s giant Fiesta event.

ACA Connects has named three new members of its leadership team, including staffers from both sides of the political aisle and one longtime top communications executive from the National Association of Broadcasters. L-r: Zamir Ahmed, VP of external affairs; Olivia Shields, VP of public affairs and communications; and Max Staloff, VP of regulatory affairs.

Entertainment marketers promoting new shows and movies can now use Samba TV measurement to understand viewership conversions generated by Snapchat campaigns.

Activist hedge fund Blackwells Capital will nominate three directors at Walt Disney Co., rivaling Trian Fund Management which is seeking two seats on the entertainment giant’s board, people familiar with the matter say. While board challenges typically represent attempts to change a company’s strategy, Blackwells is supportive of Disney CEO Bob Iger’s work, the sources say.

Rebrands, consolidation and AVOD set the tone as Netflix, Disney, Prime Video and more vie for ad-tier subscribers in the new year.

The “post-cable” news network said “unforeseen internal and external factors” caused the sudden work stoppage.

Some DirecTV customers were able to watch a national programming feed of NBC in areas where the local affiliate has been unavailable for weeks due to a prolonged dispute with Tegna, StreamTV Insider confirms. The test appears to be a first step toward replacing local broadcast affiliates with national network feeds in order to offset the loss of programming during programming disputes, like the one DirecTV currently faces with Tegna.

The FCC has held tight to anachronistic structural regulations, dealing a massive blow to broadcasters in dire need of regulatory relief. Localism will be one of the casualties.

TV station owners just got bopped on the beak by the FCC regarding local TV station ownership limits. Could another bloody nose be on the way? It’s possible. That’s the view of prominent broadcast attorney David Oxenford, a partner at Wilkinson Barker Knauer in Washington. In a Jan. 2 blog, Oxenford said the Democratic-controlled FCC could take a look at the so-called UHF Discount, which is an FCC rule that allows a single TV station owner to serve more than 39% of TV households nationally. The FCC did not take up the UHF Discount or the 39% statutory cap set by Congress during its most recent quadrennial review of its broadcast ownership rules. “With a fifth commissioner now on the FCC, the UHF Discount could again be considered, particularly if there is a proposed acquisition that places the issue before the FCC by relying on the discount to comply with the ownership rules,” Oxenford said.

Wall Street slumped to start 2024 and gave back some of last year’s big gains. Some of the market’s sharper drops came from stocks that were last year’s biggest winners. Apple lost 3.6% for its worst day in nearly five months, and Nvidia and Meta Platforms both fell more than 2%.

Omnicom this morning confirmed it has closed on its $900 million acquisition of Flywheel Digital from Ascential plc, which will operate as a new practice area within Omnicom headed by former Ascential CEO Duncan Painter, who has stepped down from Ascential’s board. The move fulfills Painter’s vision to spin off Flywheel as part of a strategic restructuring of Ascential, best known within the ad industry as the operator of the Cannes Lions festival.

Shares in EchoStar were flat Tuesday morning on the first day of trading since the closing of the wireless firm’s merger with Dish Network. The all-stock deal, announced last summer, officially closed on Sunday. Dish had been its own separate entity since being spun off by EchoStar in 2008. The reunion offers Charlie Ergen a bit more runway to try to execute his strategic turn away from pay-TV and toward wireless, though EchoStar is for now the No. 4 player in a competitive market led by Verizon and AT&T.

A new campaign from the beverage giant that starts bubbling Tuesday emphasizes its broad portfolio of drinks, not just a single product such as Fanta, Diet Coke or Dasani as has been the company’s typical marketing strategy over the years. The TV commercial, which will appear in both 30- and 90-second versions, is believed to be the first in which Coca-Cola has put a spotlight on its wider product line, rather than on a single drink.

After a difficult year for traditional advertising, top ad-tech executives see some changes coming in 2024. Growing in importance are connected TV as a channel for advertisers, the need for accountable data and a continuing shift to automation. Here are some predictions as 2024 gets underway.

Dish Network Corp. and EchoStar Corp. have completed their merger, reuniting Charlie Ergen’s satellite empire once again. The deal, which closed on Dec. 31, is key to Ergen’s plan to transition Dish away from the dwindling pay TV business and toward wireless services, challenging the likes of Verizon Communications, T-Mobile and AT&T. Dish, which had accrued significant debt, will now have access to more cash and time to expand its 5G network buildout and mobile and broadband offerings, including fixed home wireless and Boost Infinite, a low-cost mobile service.

Jobs posted to TVNewsCheck’s Media Job Center include openings for video technical support coordinator, investigative reporter, integrated digital specialist, local sales manager, creative services director, a news anchor/reporter and nightside news reporter.

The Los Angeles Times invited a panel of top entertainment industry executives from companies including Sony’s TriStar Pictures, Warner Bros. and United Talent Agency, along with producers of hits such as Barbarian, Wednesday and BS High, to participate in a wide-ranging discussion of topics including the damage done by the strikes, the challenges facing the theatrical movie business, the uncertain future of streaming and linear television and how studios and artists are responding to the threat of artificial intelligence technology.

Hulu, Netflix and other streamers are turning to bundles, discounts and ad-supported plans as customer defections rise.

Entrenched in the past, the commission has held firm — and even tightened — its deeply out-of-date regulations, dealing a deep blow to broadcasters.

TVNewsCheck will be ushering out the old and welcoming in the new by not publishing our AM, PM and Marketing Monday newsletters today. We’ll be back Tuesday, Jan. 2. See you on the other side.