Ownership

As the race to become the first company worth $1 trillion enters the final lap, technology monopolies are dominating the stock market. The five biggest companies by market value are US tech stocks: Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and Facebook. Between them they accounted for more than a third of the $2.7 trillion increase in value of the S&P 500 in the past 12 months. Worse, the top five now make up more than 15% of the S&P, the most for any top five since early 2000. Is it time to worry that the market is getting top heavy?

The Justice Department has agreed to let AT&T complete its purchase of Time Warner, according to joint government filings, likely clearing the way for the deal to be completed as soon as June 15. A federal judge ruled June 12 that AT&T's $85.4 billion bid for Time Warner was legal, imposing no conditions on the merger. The government had the option to seek a stay, delaying the merger for a designated waiting period, but has forgone that option. The Justice Department can still appeal the decision, even after the completion of a merger.

The New York State Public Service Commission ordered Charter Communications to pay a $2 million fine and complete network construction that was required as a condition of Charter's purchase of Time Warner Cable. If Charter doesn't meet its merger-related obligations, the company will "face the risk of having the merger revoked," the commission said. The commission said that state law gives it the authority to rescind merger approvals and threatened to start a proceeding to rescind or change the merger approval order if Charter refuses to comply.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai said that competition regulators should weigh the increased dominance of Google and Facebook over the digital ad market. “We do want to make sure that there is a competitive marketplace, so that involves taking a holistic view of what the market structure is,” Chairman Pai said, noting his comments were not about a specific transaction.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai is said to be planning a vote in July on limits to how many TV stations a company can own, rules he has said are too restrictive and that could factor into Sinclair Broadcast Group’s planned purchase of Tribune Media Co. Apparently, Chairman Pai is poised to schedule a July 12 vote on altering rules that cap broadcasters’ reach at 39 percent of the national audience. A vote in July could head off a decision by the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit in Washington that is considering a challenge to part of the existing rules.

Comcast has disabled a throttling system that it deployed in 2008 in order to slow down heavy Internet users. Comcast's network is now strong enough that a congestion management system isn't needed, the company says. The system has been "essentially inactive for more than a year," and is now disabled entirely.

Ion, Univision and Trinity Broadcasting say the Federal Communications Commission should not only grandfather their TV station holdings' discounted audience reach if the FCC adjusts the UHF discount or 39% audience reach cap, but should also allow them to transfer that grandfathered status to a new owner. That came in comments on the FCC's inquiry into whether that 39% cap needs to be raised or scrapped (or conceivably lowered, though that is highly unlikely). 

AT&T emerged victorious from its courtroom battle with the Department of Justice. What this means for the future of TV:

[Commentary] The AT&T/Time Waner deal is not unique. Its template was laid out in 2011 by what was then the biggest such “vertical” merger in the information and entertainment sectors: Comcast’s $30-billion takeover of NBCUniversal.  That earlier deal united a big Internet service provider with a big purveyor of content. It was pitched as bringing huge benefits to the public — improved cable TV and internet technology, more innovative TV programming, lower prices. Have you seen any of that since 2011? Me neither. 

Conservative commentator Armstrong Williams, the longtime confidant of Trump Cabinet member Ben Carson, is set to get what he called “a good deal” — three local television stations from Sinclair Broadcasting Group for just a fraction of the market price. Williams is acquiring the three stations — in Seattle (WA), Salt Lake City (UT) and Oklahoma City (OK) — for $4.95 million. That’s some $45 million to $55 million less than what Justin Nielson, a senior research analyst who tracks the broadcast sector for the data and research firm Kagan, said he would have expected.