Transcript:
Conway Gittens: I’m Conway Gittens reporting from the New York Stock Exchange. Here’s what we’re watching on TheStreet today.
Inflation is the focus on this Wednesday. Consumer prices rose 0.2 percent in October as expected. Prices were up 2.6 percent from a year ago. Over half of that price gain is tied to housing costs, which jumped 4.9 percent over the past 12 months. Wall Street believes inflation is steady enough for the Federal Reserve to keep lowering interest rates.
Related: What DirecTV, Dish Network merger means for current customers
In other news, time is running out for the 8 million people who still use DISH TV and Sling TV as their video services. A deal that would have sold both units owned by EchoStar to satellite TV provider DirecTV could be ditched. Without the financial muscle of DirecTV, Dish and Sling won’t have the money to keep up in the changing media landscape.
The original acquisition plan announced in September was contingent upon Dish debt holders agreeing to a $1.5 billion cut to the value of their investment. A group of those debt holders, however, rejected a proposed offer on the table. DirecTV says that if those debt holders don’t agree, it “will have no choice but to terminate the acquisition of Dish by midnight on November 22.”
There were high hopes for the DirecTV-Dish merger, which would have created the largest pay-TV company in the country with over 18 million subscribers. The combination would have given all the parties involved some heft at a time when traditional cable TV subscribers are fleeing for cheaper streaming services. Since 2016, DirecTV and Dish have seen 63 percent of their subscriber base disappear.
Without DirecTV, Dish will have trouble going it alone, as it weighed down by over $20 billion of debt – in a media world where content is costly and subscriber dollars are getting harder to come by.
That’ll do it for your Daily Briefing. From the New York Stock Exchange, I’m Conway Gittens with TheStreet.
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