Media Stocks Get Hammered

stock market

Pulled down in a viciously moving downward overall stock market -- attached to Greece's crushing debt problems -- media stocks got hammered on Thursday, at one point down 10% in mid-day trading.

Many big media stocks ended the day down around 4% to 6%.

By end of the trading session, Time Warner was down 3.0% to $30.90 a share; Walt Disney was rocked, losing 3.8% to $34.01; General Electric, still the home of NBC Universal, was sent back 4.4% to $17.31.

TV stations groups were not spared: Belo Corp. lost 3.5% to $7.50 a share; Sinclair Broadcast Group fall farther, 2.9% to $6.78; Lin TV receded 5.0% to $6.73.

Cable system companies were also in the big negatives. Although Cablevision Systems Corp. had fairly good results from its first-quarter results earlier in the day, it gave up 7.1% to $24.91. Comcast dropped 6.2% to $18.51.

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Satellite distributors did a bit better. Dish Network was off 2.8% to $21.20.

Print-heavy media companies also dived: Gannett lost 4.4% to $15.58; McGraw-Hill was lower by 4.8% to $30.39; The Washington Post gave up 2.5% to $488.50.

Among the big media stocks that seemed to avoid the bigger declines: News Corp. down 4.6% to $16.21 a share and Viacom losing 3.5% to $36.34 a share.

Even with positive first-quarter results reported by News Corp., Time Warner and CBS, Alan Gould, an analyst with Soleil-Gould Research Corp., told Reuters he believed "media stocks have peaked."

The news service also interviewed media investor Larry Haverty of Gabelli & Co., who was cautious about further upside for Time Warner, although he called its recent results "terrific. Six-months ago I thought the stock was undervalued. But none of the media companies are paragons of enormous value right now," he added.

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