• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, April 29, 2010

On Wednesday, Barclays Capital estimated a 20% jump in the upfront market, giving the Big Four broadcasters a combined $8.26 billion. A day later, Credit Suisse said it would be up a similar 21%, yielding a slightly higher haul of about $8.37 billion.

A principal reason for the bumps was the same: a strong scatter market may now persuade advertisers to lock in pricing this year. Both Wall Street firms indicated that networks would sell more inventory with the economy better, which would also bring in more dollars.

But for Credit Suisse, simply selling more time to drive volume is not an indicator of a healthy broadcast industry. "Sounds impressive on the surface ... we note that national TV advertising is mature," a report issued Thursday said.

A 22% increase this year would still place the combined market for ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC (and CW) far down from the $9.2 billion in a pre-recession 2008, according to Credit Suisse figures.

At the individual network level, notable is Barclays projecting about a 13% increase for NBC, while Credit Suisse has it at 20%. Barclays has Fox up 22%, while there is a plus 14% at Credit Suisse. The ABC and CBS projections do not deviate as much.

Credit Suisse forecast the cable market to be up 22% to $8.2 billion this summer. Last year, it was down about 12%.

An $8.2 billion haul for cable this year would be above a pre-recession $7.7 billion in 2008. Reasons for an increase could include new programming on sale at Discovery's Oprah Winfrey network, the NCAA tournament and Conan O'Brien at Turner.

Also, it's an election year, a plus for the major TV news networks.