• by Wayne Friedman , December 21, 2018

Media companies, especially new digital media, got caught in another whirlpool of sharply falling stock market prices -- the worst week in 10 years for many stock market indices.

Fears of a global economic slowdown, as well as a federal government shutdown, crushed media stocks, down 7.5% on the Dow Jones Media Index to 794.87 and 7.5% on the Dow Jones U.S. Broadcasting & Entertainment index to 1,185.08. On Friday, both indexes were down around 2.7% from Thursday.

The Dow Jones Industrials had its worst week since 2008, down just under 7% to 22,445. On Friday, the Dow Jones Industrials was down 1.8% -- 414 points. A fall 2008 week was part of the big financial crisis that eventually pushed the U.S. into a major recession. 

Big digital media were the big losers on Friday, with Twitter losing 6.8% to $27.31, Facebook sinking 6.3% to $124.95, Amazon giving up 5.7% to $1,377, and Netflix declining 5.5% to $246.39.

Apple and Google fared somewhat better, with Apple losing 3.9% to $150.73 and Google (Alphabet) down 3.0% to $979.54.

Some traditional TV-media companies and/or communications companies that own traditional media assets fared comparatively better, with AT&T sinking 1.2% to $28.31 and Verizon Communications falling 0.3% to $54.92.

Traditional TV network groups also got dinged less than the big digital media companies: CBS was down 1.8% to $43.36, while Viacom sank 2.4% to $25.68, AMC Networks declined 1.4% to $52.23, and 21st Century Fox gave up 2.3% to $46.90.

Two big cable operators-centric companies: Comcast Corp. gave up 2.5% to $33.75 and Charter Communications dipped 2.2% to $283.93.

Among TV station groups, Sinclair Broadcast Group lost 2.7% to $25.89, while Tribune Media slipped 0.2% to $45.00, Tegna was 3.4% lower to $10.75; and Nexstar Media Group was off 5.4% to $246.39.