Tag Archives: cmcsa

Court Ruling On Open Internet Imminent For Comcast, Verizon, AT&T

A federal appeals court could hand down a decision any day on the Open Internet Order — also called “net neutrality” — rules opposed by Internet service providers such as AT&T ( T ), Comcast ( CMCSA ) and Verizon Communications ( VZ ). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit typically releases decisions on Tuesdays and Fridays. Telecommunications, cable and wireless industry trade groups have challenged the Federal Communications Commission’s authority to enforce rules for an open Internet . In separate cases, Verizon and Comcast have successfully challenged earlier FCC net neutrality rules. A ruling from “D.C. Circuit 3” appeals court had been expected as early as April. The three-judge panel heard oral arguments in December. Judge David Tatel, who ruled against the FCC in an earlier case, in December appeared more favorable to the FCC’s position, some analysts say. Phone and cable TV stock will likely trade up or down depending on the ruling from the appeals court’s three judge panel. The case, however, could reach the U.S. Supreme Court. “Most agree this is an issue that will likely end up before the Supreme Court, especially if the FCC wins,” said Jennifer Fritzsche, a Wells Fargo analyst, in a research report published Thursday. Jonathan Atkin, an analyst at RBC Capital, said in a recent report that the appeals court may overturn rules on net neutrality that apply to wireless networks but uphold those for wireline broadband. Another court option is to “remand” the FCC’s rule-making back to the agency for additional work The FCC in February 2015 reclassified broadband services as a public utility, in order to enforce net neutrality rules under Title II of the 1934 Communications Act . The agency also expanded net neutrality rules to wireless networks for the first time. The rules bar ISPs from throttling, blocking or prioritizing Web traffic. The FCC also created a general conduct standard that ISPs cannot harm consumers or service edge providers, such as Alphabet ‘s ( GOOGL ) Google or Netflix ( NFLX ). Some consumer groups over the past six months have objected to new, so-called “zero-rated,” services offered by Verizon, Comcast and T-Mobile US ( TMUS ) that do not count video or data usage toward monthly caps.

John Malone Avoids FCC Conditions With Charter, Unlike Comcast-NBCU

Federal regulators opted to place no conditions related to John Malone’s sprawling media and telecom holdings in approving Charter Communication ’s ( CHTR ) acquisitions of Time Warner Cable ( TWC ) ( IBD ) and Bright House Networks. California regulators are expected to approve Charter’s deals as soon as Thursday, the final hurdle to Charter’s makeover. Charter will leap to No. 2 in the cable TV industry, behind Comcast ( CMCSA ). Comcast owns NBCUniversal and NBCU-related conditions that the FCC imposed on Comcast in 2011, which are set to expire in 2018. NBCU’s assets include the broadcast TV network, cable channels and a movie studio. Consumer group Public Knowledge, the American Cable Association and others asked the FCC to look into Malone’s holdings as part of the Charter review.  Dish Network ( DISH ) waged the biggest fight against the TWC deal, while  Netflix ( NFLX ) stayed on the sidelines. Malone controls Liberty Broadband ( LBDRA ), which will own about 18% of the new Charter and has rights to name three board members. Privately held media firm Advance/Newhouse will own about 13.5% of Charter. Liberty Broadband stock touched a record high for the second straight day on Wednesday. Malone holds a 28.7% voting interest in Discovery ( DISCA ); a 31.8% voting interest in Starz ( STRZA ); a 37.7% voting interest in the QVC Group, and a 3.3% voting interest in Lions Gate Entertainment ( LGF ), which holds a stake in Epix, according to the FCC. While much of Malone’s media holdings will now constitute Charter’s “affiliated programming,”  the FCC says it already has rules in place to govern those companies’ relationships with other pay-TV providers. “Because New Charter will lack the incentive or ability to withhold or raise prices of affiliated programming, we further find it unnecessary to extend or modify our program access rules or impose other conditions on the licensing of New Charter’s affiliated content,” the FCC said in its May 6  order approving Charter’s acquisitions. The FCC’s conditions on Charter’s acquisitions aim to protect competition from Internet video providers such as Netflix, Hulu and Amazon.com ( AMZN ). Charter will not be allowed to charge data usage-based prices or impose data caps on broadband customers for seven years. Those conditions could impact Comcast if it makes more acquisitions. Some analysts have speculated that Malone could consolidate some of his media assets and/or acquire more. Malone also controls Liberty Global, a Europe-based telecom company. “Malone’s ownership of distribution and content assets globally implicitly has a scale larger than even Comcast, but with a much more fragmented ownership structure and working relationships,” said a Barclays report in January.

Amazon, Comcast Content Delivery Network Push Could Hurt Akamai

Comcast ( CMCSA ) and Amazon Web Services, part of Amazon.com ( AMZN ), are becoming bigger players in the content delivery network market, posing a challenge to CDN leader Akamai Technologies ( AKAM ), according to Goldman Sachs. CDNs increase the speed of e-commerce transactions, business software downloads and video streaming to mobile devices. “Amazon is growing its Cloudfront CDN to an estimated $1.8 billion in 2016 revenues and shifting its own video delivery from independent CDNs to its own network, and startups like Fastly are growing share,” Goldman Sachs analyst Heather Bellini said in a research report. AWS is part of the e-commerce giant’s fast-growing cloud computing business. Amazon stock surged to an all-time high  on Tuesday, as the Wall Street Journal reported that Salesforce.com ( CRM ) was building a new service that uses AWS. AWS was a big reason Amazon reported its highest sales growth in nearly four years when it posted first-quarter earnings on April 28, sending the stock up nearly 10% the following day. Amazon is an IBD Leaderboard stock, with a strong IBD Composite Rating of 95, where 99 is highest. Akamai has a 59 CR. Bellini, who has a sell rating on Akamai stock, attended the 2016 Content Delivery Summit in New York on Monday, gaining views on market trends. “A key takeaway was that the competitive landscape remains intense, as Comcast looks to triple its CDN capacity next year,” wrote Bellini. Comcast, the No. 1 cable TV company, has been expanding commercial services to businesses. Comcast  moved into CDN services in late 2014, Bellini noted. One market trend could work in Comcast’s favor, said the Goldman Sachs analyst. “Multi-CDN deployments were a key theme of the conference,” she wrote, “with new startups making it easy to route traffic across multiple CDNs.” Cambridge, Mass.-based Akamai is the No. 1 provider of CDN services. Worries that big customers such as  Apple ( AAPL ) and  Facebook ( FB ) are shifting more of their data traffic to their own CDNs have pressured Akamai stock. Aside from AWS and Comcast, Akamai competes with  Level 3 Communications ( LVLT ),  Limelight Networks ( LLNW ), and Verizon Communications ( VZ ), as well as startups Fastly and CloudFlare.