Wayne Friedman

While homes that get over-the-air (OTA) TV content continue to grow slowly, the greatest change over the last three years has been with broadband-only (BBO) homes—comprising 27% of TV homes in Q4 2021, according to Nielsen. In 2018, the percentage was 9%. This has come largely at the expense of homes with traditional cable TV and other TV services—so-called "Cable Plus." These make up 57% of U.S. homes, down from 76% in the fourth quarter of 2018. The remainder are OTA homes—now estimated at 15%, up from 14% three years earlier.

Nielsen says set-top-box/return-path data coming from pay-TV providers and other sources can underrepresent certain viewer groups -- in particular Hispanic and African-American homes, compared to other household types. Compared with official US Census estimates and Nielsen’s representative national panel, these homes -- many coming from cable, satellite and telco platforms -- underrepresent Hispanics by 33%, Spanish-language dominant Hispanics by 49% and African Americans by 34%.

Earned media continues to deliver big benefits for media and entertainment brands, largely due to high-interest news viewing. Recent news concerning the presidential election and possible Russian connections with the White House are driving strong viewer and TV news content activity.

Looking at just TV networks, for the month of April so far, Fox (which would include all its brand associations) registered $224 million in media value for the month and a 97 score. CNN registered a media value of $150 million and an overall rating of 97. MSNBC, had $10.6 million in media value and an 86 rating overall. The Washington Post has produced $386.7 million in media value -- the highest amount of any news organization -- and a 96 score. The New York Times produced $216.7 million in current media value, with a 97 score. The Wall Street Journal came in at $19.6 million with a 95 rating.

For many TV industry analysts, it seems an easy projection: The new Trump Administration will mean less regulation for the TV businesses -- particularly for TV station groups, which could mean high merger activity. But Barclays Capital says don't be too sure.

One of the main points of contention is lifting the cap on the number of TV stations one company can own -- now at 39% of US TV homes. “Lifting broadcast caps [are] not easy,” writes media analyst Kannan Venkateshwar. “Broadcast ownership rules have been reviewed many times at the Supreme Court, circuit courts and Congress. Even the Republican-led FCC, while raising the limits in early 2000s, recognized the need to maintain a limit on ownership.” Secondly, it may not be the Federal Communications Commission deciding on whether to lift that cap. “Because the 39% cap was put in place by Congress, there is a school of thought that argues that only Congress can modify this cap.”

Just about one month into the new presidential administration, TV news networks are posting stronger ad business, as well as high viewership -- contradicting some criticism over fake news claims.

For example, CNN earned some $72.8 million in national advertising, according to iSpot.tv, from January 16 through February 16 -- more than double the advertising dollars levels for the same period a year ago, when it earned $33.5 million. On Feb 16, during a meeting with journalists, Jeff Zucker, chairman of CNN Worldwide, said his network brand had not beenen hurt by President Trump's false claim that much of the media was delivering so-called “fake news.” Likewise, Fox News Channel, the leader in the cable news marketplace, is also pulling in big ad dollars -- $108.8 million during that period. A year ago, Fox News was at $47.3 million for the same period.

Wall Street investors aren’t so sure that the nearly $85.4 billion deal AT&T is proposing for Time Warner will be an easy ride. Early Oct 24 trading pushed Time Warner’s stock down 2.4% to $87.33 -- all due to AT&T’s proposed deal for the company equating to a price tag of $107.50. For its part, AT&T’s stock was down nearly 2% to $36.80. Analysts are worried on two fronts: First, that federal regulatory concerns will make it a tough go for the merger to be completed. Second, that vertical media integration itself has had difficult times in working well.

Although AT&T claims it competes in virtually no areas where Time Warner operates, federal agencies may believe that media vertical integration -- that of the biggest pay TV provider in the US, AT&T’s DirecTV, and a big TV-movie content producer, Time Warner -- isn’t a good deal for consumers. Another outside reason for troubles for the deal: A new possible bidder, which is why AT&T rushed to complete it over a weekend -- just two weeks before the presidential election. Donald Trump, for example, has already said he is against the merger; Hillary Clinton will generally be tougher on mergers overall. Still, favoring this merger could be the singular weaknesses of different media companies. That could mean other possible big media deals.

As Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump now starts up a paid TV advertising campaign, he continues to lead in earned media over Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. For the month of August, Trump pulled in $509.3 million in earned media compared to Clinton’s $364.2 million, according to mediaQuant, an earned media measurement company. In July -- the month in which respective party conventions were held -- the race was closer, with Trump getting $573.4 million compared to $539.8 million for Clinton. Earned media is defined as press interviews and appearances on all media including TV, radio, online and print publications. Overall, for the trailing 12-month period, Trump has amassed $4.6 billion worth of earned media versus Clinton’s $2.5 billion. In recent days, Trump has kick-started his first paid TV advertising campaign, which analysts says is traditionally very late for a presidential candidate. Trump said TV advertising has not been necessary, given his wall-to-wall TV appearances .

Worldwide, TV viewing remains the single biggest media activity. On average, 2.58 hours per day are consumed globally, according to GlobalWebIndex’s recent Media Consumption report.

That's 23% of total time spent on the media. The US remains the biggest TV market, with an average of 4.33 hours a day. Online TV viewing continues to rise -- now at 0.7 hours a day. That's a 6% share of all media time.

Summer isn’t exactly a strong ratings playground for cable networks anymore. Top cable networks' ratings continued their decline that began at the end of April -- down 6.8% in July to 18.17 million 18-49 viewers in C3 ratings, the average commercial ratings plus three days of time-shifted data, according to a report by MoffettNathanson Research.

Cable networks traditionally use the summer period to launch their original TV shows. But now broadcast networks also compete with original programming. Analysts note that the growth of digital media is also a factor.

Winter Olympics ad spending helped push up overall US advertising nearly 6% for the first quarter. US advertising revenue for the first three months of 2014 was $34.9 billion, with the Sochi games responsible for $600 million of incremental ad spend, according to Kantar Media.

Taking out the two-week sporting event, US ad spend climbed 4%. Broadcast network TV was among the biggest gainers in the period -- up 14.5%. Spanish-language TV grew 18%; cable TV increased 6.2%; spot TV gained 7%; and national TV syndication added 3.2%.

Overall, TV grew 9.7% in the first quarter of 2014 versus the first quarter of 2013.

Display Internet business was up 13% -- with financial, retail and insurance marketers aiding their budgets.

Newspapers, magazines, and radio lost ground overall -- giving back 5.0%, 1.6%, and 2.4%, respectively.