James Marsh

http://hanoversquarecapital.blogspot.com/

6 Comments

    • New York Times Buyout Rumors Spark Heavy Wall Street Activity [view article]
      before everyone gets in a lather about yet another rumor that New York Times is getting taken out, pls peruse the company's Proxy (link below for your convenience). Flip to page 4 and read about the 1997 Trusts that control 88% of the supervote shares at NYT. The primary purpose of the Trust is to maintain the independence of the New York Times newspaper. It will be hard for the trustees to accept an offer when the purpose of the trust is so clear.

      www.nytco.com/pdf-repo...'       Oct 13 08:52 AM
    • Newspapers Embrace the Internet [view article]
      investors should be watching free cash flow growth at newspapers, not clicks or page views. one will quickly realize that despite all the promise of the internet, profits here cannot hope to offset the declining profits elsewhere in the newspaper model. even worse many of the newspapers' new foes online are bringing competition to business segments where the was once none, eroding once high margin businesses (think classfieds). the average newspaper company is only generating 5% or its revenues from the web, yet that have been talking about it since 1997! meanwhile the stocks have gone nowhere over that same period of time. why believe newspaper management now? Oct 04 09:14 AM
    • Is a Sirius-XM Satellite Radio Merger In the Works? [view article]
      While a merger might appear to make sense between the two companies, I see a number of hurdles in the way to a merger:
      1) DOJ approval is unlikely. DOJ will define the market narrowly and using their market concentration methodologies (like the HHI) the deal will be deemed unhealthy for competition.
      2) FCC will reject the merger. Just as the FCC rejected the DISH/DTV deal, FCC will bounce this proposed deal. The FCC specifically carved up this spectrum to allow for two competitors, so wont be eager to consolidate it so quickly.
      3) The companies use different technology. XM uses two geostationary satellites, while Sirius uses three satellites that rotate the earth in a proprietary orbit. Their receivers use different chipsets. Their repeater systems use different technology.
      In the end, the regulatory challenges will make it unlikely this deal ever happens.       Sep 25 09:36 AM
    • Triple Crown Media: A Complicated Spin-Off With Motivated Management [view article]
      I would be very careful with this management team. Do a bit of research on how Gray merged their newspapers into Bull Run to create TCMI. The only reason Gray's management team contributed the newspaper assets to TCMI (rather than selling them to the highest bidder and benefitting all shareholders) was to allow Bull Run to sufficiently deleverage, allowing Bull Run to refinance and eliminate J. Mack Robinson’s personal guarantee of debt approaching $59.1 million. Truly a scumbag move, imo. The more you scratch around, the more this thing smells. I would have 0 confidence in management to do the right thing. Sep 24 08:06 PM
    • E.W. Scripps Company: An Unconventional Bursting Housing Bubble Play [view article]
      Paul - usually think your analysis is spot-on, but not here. Have you watched HGTV lately? Apparently not. If you had, you would find it difficult to see a link between HGTV and Food Network programming and the housing bubble. Ratings drive cable network advertising growth and I think you will have difficulty finding any correlation between HGTV and Food Network audience ratings and the housing boom.
      I would counter this stock is cheap based on its growth rate and its newspaper peer group. Better shorts would be some of SSP's newspaper peers that have exposure to highly profitable real estate classified. Look at MNI, NYT and GCI for above average real estate classified exposure. RE classified has driven newspaper revenue growth for the past 5 years, once it turns profits will drop rapidly.       Aug 30 06:42 PM
    • Clear Channel & Citadel: There's Still Life In Radio [view article]
      agree with your comments. but dont forget to look at SBSA. investors are ignoring very strong radio growth (up 8%) at this Spanish language radio company, instead focusing on losses at a start up TV station. investors should strip out the $20MM in EBITDA losses for the TV station and assign it some value (it cost $37MM). By simply applying a 12x to EBITDA investors are inadvertently ascribing a NEGATIVE $240MM value to the TV station instead of $37MM!! This $280MM valuation mistake is almost equal to the company's market value!! Time to do some work on SBSA, it won't be at these levels for long. Aug 10 06:06 PM
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