Radio News

One week ago, it became known that the cyber-attack that took place six months ago at Entercom Communications also impacted Radio.com users. It took a filing made with the State of California in Sacramento to make the information public.

Furloughs and permanent job cuts have been made at some of the biggest radio broadcasting companies, including HeartMedia and Townsquare Media, respectively. It is now known that Beasley, which has suffered a significant decline in its stock price that even pre-dates the coronavirus pandemic-fueled Wall Street downturn, has also said goodbye to more than five dozen employees.

RBR.com UPDATE: WRDG-FM 96.7 in Union City, Ga., an iHeartMedia station that covers the southern portion of the Atlanta region, is now a simulcast partner with WBZY-FM 105.7 in Canton, Ga., which covers the northern portion of the market and formerly had the WRDA call letters. The WRDA calls are now at Urban "105.3 The Beat."

British and Polish citizens, respectively, who emerged as the buyers of an Upstate New York FM left for dead by its previous licensee in May 2019 formed a partnership with another husband-and-wife operator of radio stations in the region. Now, the two couples have united in licensee matrimony.

Loud Media, the recently formed entity forged in Upstate New York between Ricki Lee and Aaron Ishmael, is agreeing to acquire a pair of FM radio stations in the Knoxville market. An asset purchase agreement has been filed with the Commission, and it is expected to be posted May 29. RBR+TVBR has the details on the price for these Class A facilities.

An AM/FM combo serving the Lake Tahoe region finds itself in a financial quandary. In order to keep the lights on, and employees paid, it has created a GoFundMe page in an appeal to listeners that's designed to prevent a full-fledged shutdown of the stations.

The attorney representing the woman that's at the center of the investigation tells RBR+TVBR the licensee of a radio station in Pennsylvania will plead guilty to a felony on Wednesday. What does this mean for the FM? It could negate the licensee's attempt to transfer the station to his daughter for a token cost of $10.

On Friday, Salem shares suddenly rose, and the growth continued through Monday's Closing Bell. It brought SALM to its highest closing price -- $2.13 -- since June of last year. On Tuesday, the magic faded for Salem. Similarly, iHeartMedia shares were down sharply on Tuesday. But, there are key differences between why each of the companies saw share declines.

“The challenges that we have faced due to COVID-19 were unprecedented and had a severe, negative impact on our revenue in the second quarter.” Those are the words of iHeartMedia Chairman/CEO Bob Pittman, and he wasn't mincing them. The nation's largest audio media company saw a nearly 50% revenue decline in Q2. But, the podcast business is booming.

Urban One shares surged from $1.84 on June 12 to $36.30 just one week later. By July 6, however, "UONE" cooled off from this social justice movement-fueled jump, and seemed to have reached a "new normal" on Nasdaq. That's not the case, however. Urban One stock has lost 62% of its value in the last two weeks.

At the virtual Bank of America Securities 2020 Media, Communications & Entertainment Conference Thursday, iHeartMedia's CEO continued to praise podcasting which the company is heavily invested in.

On Friday, Entercom's VP of Corporate Communications and Public Relations exited for a role outside of the radio business. The audio media company that owns Pineapple Street and Cadence 13 wasted no time early Monday in announcing its new Chief Information Officer. But, this role is very different than those held by Esther-Mireya Tejeda and Jennifer Morales.

If you've ever spent time in Boston radio, you likely are familiar with the name Clark Smidt. He's well-known as the architect of "Softrock 103," the former WEEI-FM, and today serves as radio programming consultant focused on New England and New York State. Now, Smidt is becoming a licensee.