AT57

Earnings Preview: Sirius XM Radio

10 years of losses and the potential for its most high profile talent to pack it in doesn't make me want to invest in SIRI. Estute traders will always make money on stocks like SIRI as they buy and sell on news of auto numbers and such, but at the end of the day this is a business model that has matured, did not grow as projected, had to consolidate into a monopoly to survive and has otherwise drastically underperformed financially despite its position in the marketplace as the only 'pay radio' available.

Real Networks Loses on the Up-Sell

As a streaming service, Rhapsody is a great value. It is expecially valuable if you have recording software on your computer or a CD line burner attached to your system. While you are, in effect recording "less than a download" since you get nothing but the audio with your real-time recording, you are able to convert those recordings to MP3's and carry them anywhere via any portable music player, including your i-Pod.

America: Is This the End of an Era?

Morph says, "...The one hope for salvation though is that, unlike other Ponzi schemes, the existing investors in US Treasuries, which includes a lot of foreign governments, have a real interest in keeping the scheme afloat"

Oh...do you mean "too big to fail?" Like Lehman Brothers? or do you mean "too big to fail" as the moral compass and the melting pot of the free world?

We will, as a nation, survive the greed and averice of the Wall Street criminals who both lobbied and against Government regulation and defied what little regulation there was.

Our bigger challenge is to continue down the path of religious and social freedom, and to have a larger majority of our citizens take advantage of the opportunities that are available to us via education and civil service, without being dragged down by those around them who are uninterested and uninvolved.

Fed Up with Sirius' Childish Customers

Brandon, put in a bunch of CD's or plug your i-Pod into your dash and stop paying $150+ annually for a deteriorating service. Just like 'old-fashioned' radio is screwing itself by not investing in local content, SATRAD is screwing itself by not listening to the listeners. Mel has already watered down the music content by getting rid of the hosts. If I just wanted a music loop, I'd load up my i-pod and save the susbscription fee. Radio, SAT or otherwise, is all about what's between the songs, or who is talking. Wait until Howard's deal is up. Wait until the NFL deal is up. If SATRAD is so great, why can't Howard break the 10% of his former listeners numbers from 'old-fashioned' radio? Oh...maybe because it's FREE radio.

3 Sirius Scenarios Outlined by Citi

Wow...I can get a Starmate 5 and it will pay for itself after about 18 months of $6/per month instead of $13/per month subscription. I'm sure there will be a run on those for Christmas. Actually, it would look better to give each of my loved ones 100 shares of SIRI. And it would only cost half of what the Starmate 5 would have cost. Either way, by Valentine's Day it will be worth less than I'd pay for it.

Libor Update: Still Frozen

This will be particularly ugly for 5-1 ARM's that reset to 30, 60 or 90 LIBOR at 12/31/08 as well as businesses where LOC's and senior debt is pegged to 30 day LIBOR. I'm a neophyte at this stuff, but will LIBOR rates move in the same direction as the Fed Funds rate, assuming there a rate cut on the horizon?

Circuit City Falls Further: 'Bring Out Your Dead'

Thanks for reminding me, Bill. Each of those actions is a clear reminder that the addage, "You can't cut your way to prosperity" still rings true.

When you sacrifice customer service in a retail business to save a few dollars, you usually pay for it tenfold. If the buying experience for the end user at CC was at all better than average - their main competitor, BB offers average service, at best - they would not be in the fix they're in.

Key Flaws in the Bailout Legislation

I'm not a Democrat, but if you would look at the HOLC that FDR set up in the early '30s, you'd see a way of attacking the foreclosure side of this problem going forward. That should come FIRST! Then, if the Government wants to get into greasing the wheels of credit, they can use whatever resources remain. I would not trust the current heads of banks and other lending institutions to do right by the little guy. They rarely, if ever, do.

Circuit City Falls Further: 'Bring Out Your Dead'

Hmm...Best Buy is OK...Circuit City is D-E-A-D! Could this have anything to do with the fact that one of the first directives of the soon to be outgoing CEO was to get rid of all experienced SALES management and floor sellers and replace them (or not) with less expensive and far less experienced help?

Sirius XM at Work - Largest Pool of Potential Subscribers

Well, this MIght Be Sirius says, "how come people dont have wireless internet radio's in their houses?? Where wireless is found in almost every home already ... People are still buying satellite rads for their homes... If you can tell me why ill believe you .... "

First, people aren't buying sattelite radio receivers for their houses. If they were, Best Buy and Circuit City would be much happier. People are WIRING THEIR COMPUTERS TO RECEIVERS AND STREAMING AUDIO AROUND THE HOUSE. Good old fashioned technology marrying a new way to bring in audio content. And it's a MUCH broader pool of listening than XM/SIRI offers...Internet radio, FREE concerts from Wolfgang's Vault, Internet streams of 'old' radio from around the world...and XM/SIRI programming if you're willing to pay for it. Evidently, not many people are. You're already paying for cannectivity in your home, right?

Relmor, whether you fart on the moon or not, XM/SIRI still stinks as an investment. And it will in the long term because no more than 8-9% of potential users of the product are going to abandon FREE radio in their cars, regardless of whether there is a stable enough technology to bring Internet streaming to cars. At home, if I wanted non -stop 50's, 60's, 70's, reggae metal or whatever to listen to all day, I'd run "Music Choice" (which I already pay for via Comcast digital) through my receiver and have most of the SIRI/XM music formats covered. Why on earth do I need a satellite radio in my home??? To listen to Howard talk to strippers? I can choose from any sports station in America on any given morning via the web and be better entertained. Face it, XM/SIRI = BROKEN BUSINESS MODEL...unless they can sell advertising and stop charging for the service. And then, you'll all complain about the commmercials.

Sirius XM at Work - Largest Pool of Potential Subscribers

As long as it's $13 a month to have 'background music' available at a construction site or in the office, SIRI/XM is dead in the water. RADIO IS FREE. RADIO IS EVERWHERE. When shareholders have to beg people to buy satellite radios and subscribe to this service, what does that tell you about consumer demand. Nobody had to cajole me into paying Comcast for their service. And they don't provide anywhere near the amount of programming that SIRI/XM does. I'll be just fine with FREE radio and Internet streaming. And when wi-fi is $13/month and available in cars, SIRI/XMm days are numbered.

Are New Digital Music Payments Enough?

You say, "But now Activision Blizzard CEO Robert Kotick is fighting back, saying maybe music labels should pay them! His argument: music games make songs more popular, driving paid song downloads, album sales, and ticket sales."

Good for him...Didn't Activision have to receive express permission from Aerosmith (one of the games' music partners) to use their likeness AND THEIR MUSIC in the body of the game? Did the band's agents give that permission in exchange for a fee payable to the artist? RIAA shoud have NO claim to performance royalties in this case. Also, it seems that the RIAA's willingness to accept a 'percentage of revenue' model from Rhapsody and other music subscription services like it, where anyone with an analog receiver and CD burner attached to their computer can take copies of SELECTED MUSIC at will, and not take the same deal with Internet streaming stations where selective music piracy is far more difficult, leads me to beileve that the RIAA sees linkage between Internet streaming and broadcast radio, where they have been unsuccessfully fighting for the performance royalty for 70 years.

Smarten up, RIAA...forcing Internet only operations like Pandora to die in their cribs won't make up for your industry's shortsighted, stupid sales model mistakes of the past decade. And expecting the 'old' radio industry to pay you to promote your product now since you believe that promotional value has diminished with the advent of the Internet- see above - is even more short sighted and stupid. Will you be looking for a performance royalty from movie producers, TV producers and the like for the inclusion of songs into their soundtracks?
THEY ARE HELPING YOUR ARTISTS BY DOING THAT...NOT STEALING FROM THEM. Your industry may be, with the possible exception of investment banking, the most stupidly run industry ever.
Go figure out how to monetize music without trying to kill the media that wants to help you sell music. One potential bailout is enough, thanks.

Don't Believe Everything You Hear About Sirius

"The newly merged Sirius XM is expected to close out the year with 19.5 million satellite radio subscribers. Its target for next year is 21.5 million. To put that number into perspective, the company's subscriber numbers are not far behind those of cable giant Comcast (Nasdaq:CMCSA), which has 24.6 million subscribers."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't 'radio that sucks' have 230+ million people listening to it every day? And doens't Comcast compete with many other cable companies as well as Verizon in key geographies for its subscriber base?

For satellite radio AS A MONOPOLY within its domain - paid audio entertainment delivered primarily to cars - to project less than 1% of the 'old radio' base will add their services over the next year doesn't make me feel really happy about their growth prospects.

On top of that, 'subscriber' doesn't mean 'paid subscriber' since that first year 'trial' you get with new vehicles is not paid in full by the auto manufacturers. Also, how many of these 'subscriptions' are currently cars sitting in the lots of auto dealerships around the nation?

Sell Sell Sell.

Is Sirius XM Headed the Way of Old Radio?

This is really all about delivery systems. At the end of the day, Internet access into vehicles will kill the satellite radio star. There will be so many options for audio entertainment - streaming 'old radio' stations, internet stations, 'Rhapsody-type services, etc. that your choice will be to pay for wi-fi or pay for SIRI/XM, relegated to their channels only. I'll take Internet access in the car vs. satellite radio. I don't think I'm alone.

The Sirius/XM Disaster: The Ashes of the FCC

Whether it took the Commission 18 days, 18 months, or 18 years to make the decision to allow two broken businees models to merge into one monopolisitc broken business model, the results for the shareholder would at this point, be the same. Companies that project rapid and substantive growth that cannot deliver on that promise get severly punished by Wall Street since all of those promises are priced in prior to actual results. Sirius/XM, like most other companies, can't cut their way to prosperity. If you eliminated 100% of the operating expense of XM you still have to face the fact that this audio entertainment niche will never have more that 8-9% of the available adult radio listening audience willing to pay for its services, and, that will contract when wi-fi is available in more cars. It's amazing that logical investors would believe that just because a reciever was going to be made available in a majority of new cars that more than 10% of these new car buyers would pay $12-$14 monthly, and on an ongoing basis for either XM, Sirius or the combined service. The dirty little secret within the business is that the churn rate would be TRIPLE what is reported without the '3 free month' offers that are aggressively pushed after the initial 'free 12 months with purchase of the vehicle' runs out. Fact is, those '3 free months' turn into 'free service' since Sirius/XM would take a far bigger beating if it stopped counting those vehicles - and vehicles that sit on lots unsold - as 'active subscribers'. Simple math applies here 1 POS + 1 POS = 1 big POS.