With the end of the World Cup approaching and the start of football season coming up in August, DirecTV and E.W. Scripps have announced a new multi-year agreement that will return 54 local broadcast stations owned and operated by the station group to DirecTV’s streaming, satellite, and U-verse customers.

The agreement ends a five-week blackout affecting millions of customers across 36 Nielsen DMAs, including Baltimore, Buffalo, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Denver, Detroit, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Milwaukee, Nashville, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Tampa-St. Petersburg, and others.

“These agreements recognize the enduring value of local television stations as essential infrastructure for American communities,” said Adam Symson, Scripps’ president and CEO. “Our stations save lives with severe weather alerts, provide critical emergency information during natural disasters, deliver local news that informs and holds power in check, and unite communities through live sports that no other platform can replicate."

“Fair compensation from distribution partners ensures we can sustain these essential public services for millions of Americans who depend on us for accessible, trusted connection to what matters most in their daily lives," he added.

While the agreement ends the dispute, DirecTV continued to criticize the process of negotiating new retransmission consent agreements with station groups.

“[W]e are frustrated that broadcasters use blackouts as a tool to force us to accept unwarranted rate hikes that consistently exceed normal, inflationary increases, and by a lot,” said Rob Thun, chief content officer at DirecTV. “At a time when affordability matters more than ever, families are too often asked to pay more while receiving less…[A]s ownership becomes concentrated among a handful of ever-larger broadcasters gaining stations across new and within their existing markets, those expanded stations become increasingly powerful and further unbalanced negotiating tools. The more markets and major network affiliations a broadcaster controls, the greater its ability to withhold programming from the very communities it is meant to serve.”

“Consumers should never lose access to essential local television because of a carriage dispute,” he added. “It's time to modernize the system so it rewards service to local communities—and not consolidated market power—by returning to the original purpose of broadcasting of putting viewers’ interests first.”

Separately, DirecTV is part of an antitrust lawsuit in California seeking to block the Nexstar/Tegna merger that would further consolidate the industry.

Broadcasters have long argued that consolidation is necessary to help them compete with big tech companies who already dominate the ad and streaming businesses.

Gray Media and Dish continue to trade barbs over a retransmission dispute that has prevented Dish subscribers from watching 226 local stations owned by station group in 113 markets across the U.S.

The Gray stations were dropped from the Dish lineup on March 10 after the two sides were unable to reach an new retransmission consent agreement, with retransmission fees being the main sticking point.

“For the first time in its history, Gray Media’s television stations have been dropped by Dish Network, a serial instigator of disputes that have removed thousands of broadcast and cable channels from their paying customers over the years,” Gray said in a statement, which included a long list of retransmission consent blackouts between Dish and various broadcasters. “Gray’s track record for fair and reasonable distribution negotiations is undisputed in the industry. Gray has never had its signals dropped by a satellite operator, and its last multimarket cable system dispute lasted just a few days over a decade ago.”

Gray, which accused Dish of not negotiating in good faith as required by FCC rules, also said that “Dish’s action…follows weeks of Dish operating under extensions of the companies’ prior distribution agreement that Gray provided to prevent Dish from removing Gray’s signals to its paying customers during the Super Bowl, Winter Olympics, NBA All-Star Game, and numerous breaking news emergencies occurring in many of Gray’s local markets over the past several weeks. To the great surprise and disappointment of Gray’s leadership, Dish insisted that Gray agree to a materially adverse provision in the new agreement that is unlike any provision in any distribution agreement with Gray’s roughly 400 other distribution partners, and, to Gray’s knowledge, unprecedented in the several decade history of the pay-TV industry across any cable or DBS operator and any broadcaster. Because this new demand from Dish has no precedent in history, it is flatly inconsistent with marketplace conditions in clear violation of Dish’s federal statutory obligation to negotiate retransmission in good faith.”

“Dish’s tactics here are all too familiar for the shrinking number of consumers who still subscribe to their service: from 14 million in 2014 to 5 million today,” Gray Media concluded.

For its part, Dish said that “following Gray Media's decision to black out its local stations from the Dish TV lineup, 226 channels in 113 markets are currently unavailable to Dish customers. Gray Media chose to disconnect these stations—which provide critical local news, sports, and weather—after Dish refused to accept unreasonable rate increases that would have raised monthly bills for consumers.”

"It is deeply disappointing that Gray Media is using its viewers as bargaining chips," said Kevin Covell, senior vice president, DISH Video Services. "We offered a fair agreement to keep these stations on the air, but Gray Media walked away. Gray Media chose to black out their own viewers, rather than reasonably negotiate, in an attempt to extract significantly higher fees."

Dish also accused Gray of introducing `last-minute’ “demands regarding stations they don't yet own, stalling negotiations just hours before expiration. Dish remains ready to restore these channels immediately if Gray Media agrees to a fair, market-based deal.”

NTCA—The Rural Broadband Association (NTCA) has come out strongly against the proposed merger of Nexstar and Tegna in a filing with the Federal Communications Commission arguing that “any relaxation of the national television ownership cap” will force operators to pay higher retransmission consent fees, which in turn will have a “severe and worsening impact” on rural communities by forcing consumers to pay higher prices.

“NTCA therefore opposes the merger and urges the Commission to reject it as contrary to the public interest and inconsistent with the Commission’s commitment to serving rural America,” the group said.

NTCA is an industry association composed of approximately 850 community-based companies and cooperatives that provide advanced communications services in rural America and more than 400 other firms that support or themselves are engaged in the provision of such services.

In a Jan. 26 filing with the FCC, the NTCA cited survey data that “highlights the troubling escalation of retransmission costs foisted upon rural video providers. In their most recent retransmission consent negotiations, rural MVPDs experienced average fee increases of $128,351, a substantial rise from the $104,020 increase in 2024 and the $78,022 increase in 2023,” the group said. “This acceleration in fee growth demonstrates that the cost pressures identified by NTCA in previous comments are only intensifying. The impact on rural consumers is severe, as roughly 87% of these providers report having had to pass these increased fees directly on to their subscribers. Research continues to demonstrate that MVPDs pay significantly more for programming from large, consolidated broadcast groups compared to independent stations.”

“Nexstar Media is already among the nation’s largest and most powerful broadcast groups,” the filing stressed. “The proposed addition of Tegna’s 64 stations would concentrate further control over programming. Based on the pattern evident in NTCA’s survey data, approval of this merger would likely deliver to Nexstar even greater bargaining power to demand higher retransmission consent fees, with rural MVPDs and their consumers bearing the cost. The timing of this merger application, following a year of particularly steep fee increases, underscores the critical importance of maintaining ownership limits to preserve whatever negotiating leverage remains for small rural operators.”

The full filing can be found here.

TV Tech’s full coverage of the proposed deal can be found here and here with numerous articles laying out arguments by Nexstar and Tegna that the ownership caps should be lifted and that the deal would have a positive impact on the broadcast industry.

LONG ISLAND CITY, N.Y.—With a deadline looming for inking a new retransmission consent deal with Tegna, the cable operator Optimum has issued a statement, forcefully rejecting what it calls “excessive and unjustified demands from Tegna."

"Tegna is pursuing egregious fee increases that are divorced from market reality, including a massive 30% hike for major network affiliates and a colossal 50% increase for The CW,” the operator said in a press release.

“Optimum will always take a stand for our customers against broadcasters and programmers demanding significantly higher fees for the same content,” Keith Bowen, president of news, programming and business services at Optimum, said. “Tegna is operating as if the market hasn’t changed in 20 years and its request is nothing short of egregious.

TV Tech has reached out to Tegna for comment.

In the Optimum release, the operator also stressed the link between rising retrans fees and consolidation in the broadcast station business. Broadcasters believe consolidation will help them better compete against big tech firms, while pay TV operators believe it will lead to higher prices for programming.

“These demands from Tegna cannot be viewed in isolation; they are directly linked to the looming merger of Nexstar and Tegna and a broadcasting industry that is rapidly contracting into a duopoly,” the release said. “In fact, Optimum’s negotiations with Tegna and Nexstar—with expirations just one week apart—expose the dark side of broadcaster consolidation.

Optimum did not say when its deal with Tegna expired but others have reported the deadline was in December 2025.

Earlier this year, Nexstar's stations were blacked out on Optimum between Jan. 10 and 18, when a new deal was reached.

"Tegna is attempting to lock in skyrocketing rates now, effectively forcing Optimum’s constituents to pre-pay for a merger that will only reduce their choices,” Bowen said. “Optimum is taking this stand not just for today, but to stop a trend where broadcasters use the threat of blackouts to fund their takeover sprees. As broadcasters race to consolidate, they are leaving the consumer behind. Optimum urges policymakers to look closely at how these rate demands serve as a precursor to anticompetitive behavior.”

BALTIMORE—As it announced new debt offerings, Sinclair, Inc. released released preliminary unaudited Local Media segment fourth-quarter 2024 media revenues and certain media operating expenses that show the company will product slightly lower than expected local media revenue. The preliminary figures show distribution revenue higher than expected while non-political ad revenue indicated a weakening ad market.

Most 2025 projections of local broadcast-TV ad revenue have indicated that core advertising excluding political will decline for the industry in 2025.

Sinclair expects Local Media segment media revenues to be $931 million to $933 million for the three months ended Dec. 31, 2024, down modestly from the company’s previously disclosed guidance of $936 million to $945 million. This includes political advertising revenue of approximately $203 million (versus previously disclosed guidance of $204 million), core (nonpolitical) advertising revenue of $300 million to $301 million (versus previously disclosed guidance of $307 million to $315 million) and distribution revenue of $392 million to $393 million (versus guidance of $386 million to $388 million), as well as other media revenue of approximately $37 million (versus previously disclosed guidance of $38 million), the company reported.

In addition, the company expects fourth-quarter 2024 Local Media segment combined preliminary media programming and production expenses and media selling, general and administrative expenses of $580 million to $582 million, which compares favorably to the company’s previously disclosed guidance of a total of $589 million to $590 million for the total of these two expense line items.

The company plans to report its fourth-quarter 2024 earnings results at 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2025, followed by a conference call to discuss the results at 4:30 pm ET. The preliminary results are unaudited estimates only and are subject to revision, the company stressed.

NEW YORK—Supreme Court of the State of New York Appellate Division in the First Judicial Department has upheld a lower court ruling that Nexstar fraudulently collected $10.5 million in retransmission fees from DirecTV. 

Nexstar had appealed a New York Supreme Court ruling issued on July 17. In the suit, DirecTV said that it had been paying retransmission feeds for WHAG in Hagerstown Maryland based on WHAG’s NBC affiliation. 

“WHAG lost its NBC affiliation on July 1, 2016, approximately one year into the agreement’s three-year term, and defendant later changed WHAG’s call sign and rebranded the station, the Appellate Division order said. “However, defendant did not inform plaintiff that WHAG had lost its affiliation and continued to collect more than $10.5 million in Unlaunched Station Fees pertaining to WHAG for the remainder of the agreement’s term. When plaintiff discovered that WHAG had become an independent station, it informed defendant that it would no longer pay the Unlaunched Station Fee and asked defendant to return the Unlaunched Station Fees that it had paid following the loss of WHAG’s NBC affiliation. Defendant refused, and plaintiff stopped paying the Unlaunched Station Fees.”

During the case, DirecTV also presented evidence that Nexstar had been told by NBC that it would lose the affiliation for WHAG. 

“Despite defendant’s unproven, self-serving contentions that it expected to renew its NBC affiliation agreement and that it worked until the last second to secure an extension from NBC, there was unrebutted testimony from two NBC employees who testified that NBC advised defendant that there would be no further extensions to WHAG’s NBC affiliation beyond its June 30, 2016 termination, and that NBC never suggested to defendant that it might reconsider this decision,” the order noted. “Thus, defendant knew that the termination of the NBC affiliation was a fait accompli and intentionally concealed this information from plaintiff.”

“Supreme Court properly found that plaintiff’s fraudulent inducement cause of action could provide a separate basis for recovery of Unlaunched Station Fees,” the order also stated. 

The majority of pay-TV operators upped their broadcast fees 12.8% in 2023, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence Kagan. 

Six out of the nine MVPDs tracked by Kagan raised the retrans fees paid to broadcasters during the past 12 months, bringing the national average to approximately $21.48 per month consumers pay to watch local broadcast channels on their pay-TV service. 

However, Kagan says the rate slowed compared to the 14% increase in retrans fees in 2022, attributing the decrease over cord-cutting and the myriad station blackouts that occurred during 2023. Kagan estimates that the 2024 figure will grow 14%, representing $22.62 of the average pay-T bill. 

Kagan estimates that the average retrans fee per subscriber charged to cable, telco and DBS operators in 2024 will grow 14% to $22.62. Among the providers, Kagan found that Comcast’s Denver market imposed the highest broadcast TV fee at an average $34.75 per subscriber every month. Cable One was the only cable provider that didn't change its broadcast fee in 2023. 

NEW YORK—Fox Corporation’s Q1, 2024 earnings report and call with analysts saw the company report notable growth in its streaming service Tubi and increases in affiliate fee revenue for its TV segment, which includes the Fox-owned local TV stations, despite cord cutting and the ongoing decline of pay TV subscriptions. 

While advertising declined by 2%, the company reported that sports helped boost overall viewing of the Fox brands by 2%.

Revenue for the quarter and earnings per share generally beat analyst expectations. 

In the earnings call with analysts, Lachlan Murdoch, executive chair and CEO said that “with total viewing of FOX brands up 2% in the quarter. Fox Sports was a big driver of that consumption especially, with its broadcast of the Women's World Cup where the US versus the Netherlands on Fox was the most watched Women's World Cup game match, ever on US English language television.” 

Murdoch also expects “engagement to improve significantly,” as the NFL and college football seasons progress.  

“At Tubi, we had another enviable quarter delivering 30% revenue growth driven by an impressive 65% lift in total view time,” Murdoch said. “Tubi surpassed 70 million monthly active users in September, logged nearly four billion streaming hours in the first half of the calendar year and remains the number one AVOD player and most watched free ad-supported TV streaming service in the United States. Additionally, Tubi has beaten Pluto Max Paramount+ and Peacock in view time for five consecutive months. One reason for the high engagement level that Tubi is its extensive content library that now exceeds 60,000 titles which translates into more than 225,000 movies and TV episodes in addition to approximately 300 fast channels.”

“Tubi also offers a unique and compelling proposition to advertisers,” he added. “Our recent MRI study of streaming peers concluded that Tubi saw the fastest growth amongst young and diverse populations. And that Tubi is able to deliver high-value, net new audiences with 33% of Tubi streamers unreachable on other top AVOD services.”

In terms of affiliate fees, the company acknowledged the fact that cord cutting continues to reduce pay TV subs but Steve Tomsic, CFO, said that their television segment “delivered total quarterly revenues of $1.78 billion or a 4% increase year-over-year. This was driven by an 8% increase in TV affiliate revenues with healthy growth in fees across all Fox-affiliated stations more than offset the impact from industry subscriber declines.”

Tomsic reported, however, that “cable affiliate revenues were down 2% in the quarter, largely a result of industry subscriber declines, which continue to run in the 8% range.”

 NEW YORK—Despite cord cutting and record pay TV sub losses in 2022, S&P Global Market Intelligence is reporting that U.S. TV station owners’ retransmission and carriage fees from cable, direct broadcast satellite, telco video operators and virtual multichannel providers reached an estimated $14.46 billion in 2022, up 3% from $14.08 billion in 2021.

Justin Nielson, principal analyst at S&P Global Market Intelligence explained that “Although traditional multichannel churn outpaced virtual subscriber gains in 2022, increases in average per-subscriber rates in renewals and annual step-ups kept gross retransmission revenues growing, albeit at a much slower pace than years prior.”

Similar growth is also expected in 2023, as rate hikes in renewals are expected to slightly outpace the cord-cutting trend, resulting in a 3% gain in gross retransmission and virtual subscriber fee revenues to $14.83 billion, the report said. 

Longer term, these revenues will likely grow by percentages in the low single digits, to $15.93 billion by 2027. 

Even so the report highlighted some worrying trends. 

Generally, TV station owners have continued to be successful in securing higher retransmission fees in each renewal period, albeit with some major disruptions at the end of 2022 and beginning of 2023. But as consumers shift their viewing habits and subscription dollars to streaming, local TV station affiliates that want to be carried by virtual multichannel operators are beholden to carriage fees set by the networks, with most stations receiving less on a net basis than traditional multichannel operators.

As a result, the share that goes back to the TV stations is expected to decline slightly from about 50% in 2018–20 to 49% in 2021–24 and 48% in 2026–27, the researchers said.

Others have worried that ongoing cord cutting would eventually produce reductions in retransmission fees. 

In a provocative note to investors, three analysts at LightShed Partners take up the question of retransmission fees, which have become one of the largest revenue sources for local TV station groups, and conclude that it “[f]eels like management and investor expectations for revenue growth are inflated, with serious headwinds growing.”

The post by Richard Greenfield, Brandon Ross And Mark Kelley noted they were prompted to take up the issue after hearing Dish Network chairman Charlie Ergen argue that RSNs are on the way out and that retrans fees are on the way down.

““The fact that the local networks now are going the path of regional sports where the cost gets so high that… any rational company will make more money by not having the service…broadcasters themselves are cutting back on the content, and so they’re not producing the high-value drama shows and stuff are going somewhere else to OTT,” Ergen complained in the Q4 conference call with investors. [Edits to the transcript here were made by the Lightshed analysts.] “Customers are following them there…our customers are going to find alternatives to the [broadcast] networks. And even the mainstay of professional football, which is probably the one mainstay they [broadcasters] have, is readily available to a number of sources today. So the next step in retrans is down, not up… I said it about regional sports, I’m saying it now. That’s where that’s going. And it’s a shame because the local broadcasters are caught in a vice between the network and the distributors. So we have some empathy for their plight, but we cannot be their bank unless we get a return. And right now, we don’t get a return.”

The LightShed partners analysts noted that “broadcast TV station groups have been incredibly savvy over the past decade leveraging an antiquated regulatory system that dates back to the 1992 Cable Act to drive retransmission consent fees....Given the inability of government officials to update the television regulatory landscape, annual retrans fees now exceed the $12 billion (tax) we forecasted back in 2013.”

Looking forward, they note that cord cutting, the shift of sports rights to streaming, the growing investments in streaming content and other factors are however making the local stations less valuable to operators. 

“All major new general entertainment programming has shifted to streaming platforms vs. broadcast TV, with more and more sports content shifting from broadcast to streaming (most notably Thursday Night Football, which was the #2 series on broadcast before moving to Amazon Prime)....Time spent watching broadcast TV is falling rapidly, yet the annual cost of retrans continues to rise,” they wrote. 

“We could not help but think broadcast TV stations are headed for massive disruption,” they conclude. 

On major factor is that "cord-cutting is hovering today around 7% and all signs point to a meaningful acceleration over the next couple of years,” they wrote, adding that the “price/value of multichannel video bundle is worsening. Cost of the bundle to the consumer continues to rise, even as there is less and less quality programming, as legacy media companies now launch all their new shows direct-to-streaming.”

They also argued that “as the Regional Sports business model literally melts down in 2023,...diehard sports fans are getting new ways to access local sports without a multichannel bundle. Just this past week, MSG+ was announced at a $30/month price point to access Knicks/Rangers/Islanders/Devils/Sabers content, no bundle required.”

They also suggest that the bargaining position of stations with vMVPDs is deteriorating, citing the recent retrans spat with FuboTV. 

“Earlier this year, the CBS Affiliate Board rejected CBS’ retransmission consent agreement for vMVPDs,” they argued. “In turn, Fubo lost access to CBS affiliates across the country. However, CBS (owned by Paramount), was able to replace the local affiliate feed with the national feed of CBS. Importantly, that national feed includes CBS primetime programming, national morning shows, national news, late-night national talk-shows, and, maybe most importantly, Sunday afternoon local/regional NFL games.”

Local station groups like Nexstar have argued that their local news programming still gives them tremendous leverage. 

“We hope NXST [Nexstar] management does not actually believe that as retrans would be a tiny fraction of what it is today without the power/leverage of NFL games on Sunday,”  Richard Greenfield, Brandon Ross and Mark Kelley at LightShed wrote. 

In addition, viewers, they argue, viewers have other choices for local news, both from digital media and other local stations. 

WASHINGTON—ACA Connects is worried about the transformation of broadcast TV from something local to something more corporate, which it says is evident in the rising retransmission consent fees, which saw a nearly 20% increase in 2019.

A recent meeting with a representative from FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington’s office with ACA Connect’s Ross Lieberman and outside counsel Michael Nilsson, detailed in an ex parte filing, discussed how growing consolidation is impacting the broadcast industry, i.e., local stations are now often dealing with corporate representatives, which could raise numerous policy issues.

One such issue is the rising retransmission consent fees. Citing a FCC report, ACA Connects points out that cable operators paid more than $5.5 billion dollars in retransmission fees in 2019, up 19.2% from the previous year. ACA Connects says that it has heard from broadcasters that the demand for high and increasing fee prices continued in 2020, which it claims is backed up by analyst reports.

With these increases, there is a disparity between small cable operators and large ones, ACA Connects notes. Per the FCC report, small cable operators paid $178.13 per subscriber, per year in retransmission fees. Large cable operators, meanwhile, paid on average $124.67 per subscriber, a 43% difference. “And according to the FCC, the disparity between small and large cable systems is only getting larger,” ACA Connects wrote.

In addition, these increased fees and disputes over them have led to an increased number of TV blackouts. Per ACA Connects, 2019 saw 219 instances of broadcasters blacking out their signal. In 2020, there were a reported 342 blackouts.

“In other words, on nearly 350 occasions last year, cable and satellite subscribers who had one nothing wrong lost access to local news and network programming, just so the largest broadcasters could serve their bottom line,” wrote ACA Connects.

However, ACA Connects did note two positive developments regarding retransmission fees. The first was the implementation of the Television Viewer Protection Act of 2019. This law requires large TV station ownership groups to negotiate retrans in good faith with buying groups like the National Cable Television Cooperative. ACA Connects members said that NCTC helped conclude retransmission deals with many large broadcast groups covered by TVPA.

Also, ACA Connects praised that the FCC is beginning to enforce good-faith negotiation rules, including a nearly $10 million fine against Sinclair Broadcast Group stations and $48 million in fines against Sinclair itself.

Other suggestions made during the meeting to address concerns of broadcast consolidation and retransmission consent included a national ownership cap, local ownership rules, “the totality of circumstances” test for good faith negotiations, ATSC 3.0 or the proceeding seeking to define MVPDs.

The complete ex parte filing is available through the FCC website. 

WASHINGTON—Local TV stations had a saving grace during the height of the coronavirus earlier this year as ad revenue was dropping, retransmission fees. According to a Pew Research Center report on the second quarter of 2020, local TV stations’ gain from retrans fees outperformed what they lost in ad revenue.

Studying the revenue reports from Sinclair, Tegna, Nexstar, Gray and E.W. Scripps—which together own or operate more than 600 stations in the U.S.—Pew found that their ad revenue fell by a median of 24% (Nexstar’s year-over-year numbers do not include former Tribune stations as the companies merged post Q2 2019). Even in a presidential election year, for all station groups but Gray, ad revenue was down from the mid-term elections in 2018.

But retransmission fees paid by cable providers negated these losses, as the median year-over-year increase for the five companies was 37%, helped by an increase in viewership during the early days of the pandemic. Pew says that this equates to a median increase of $87.3 million in revenue; Pew estimates that ad revenue dropped $67.9 million during Q2.

Sinclair was reported to have the biggest jump, earning more than $1 billion in retransmission fees in Q2 2020, compared to $367 million in Q2 2019.

TV news media overall actually saw general increases in its ad revenue for Q2 2020. Pew found that network TV (ABC, CBS and NBC) saw an 11% increase in ad revenue during the quarter. Cable networks, meanwhile, combined netted a 2% year-over-year increase, but it was a different story for each network, with Fox News Channel seeing an increase of 41%, CNN decreasing 14% and MSNBC dipping 27% in ad revenue.

For the complete study, visit Pew’s website.

ENGLEWOOD, Colo.—A retransmission consent and carriage fees dispute between Dish Network and Fox has led to a blackout of Fox local stations and cable channels for Dish and Sling TV customers as of Thursday, Sept. 26.

The blackout impacts the local Fox stations of 17 markets across 23 states and Washington, D.C., while cable networks FS1, FS2, Big 10 Network, Fox Soccer Plus and Fox Deportes were also removed.

According to a press release from Dish, Fox is demanding a double-digit percentage rate increase to continue carrying its local channels, as well as to “force bundle” its local channels and unrelated cable networks.

“Taken together, Fox’s actions are profoundly anti-consumer,” said Andy LeCuyer, Dish senior vice president of programming. “Fox is raising prices and turning its back on its public obligation to provide channels to consumers for free. It’s clear that Fox cares more about padding its bottom line than serving its viewers.

“We ask Fox to stop punishing its own viewers so we can focus on reaching a fair deal,” Lecuyer concluded.

In a statement given to Jon Lafayette of TVT’s sister publication Broadcasting & Cable, a Fox Corporation spokeperson said: “Dish/Sling is at it again, choosing to drop leading programming as a negotiating tactic regardless of its impact on its own customers. Dish/Sling elected to drop Fox networks in an effort to coerce us to agree to outrageous demands. While we regret this is Dish/Sling’s preferred approach to negotiating, we remind our loyal viewers that the Fox services are widely available through every other major television provider.”

Dish also announced that its customers can still access Fox stations through alternative methods. The company said that as it works to reach an agreement with Fox it will offer digital over-the-air antennas to affected Dish customers at no cost so they can still access local Fox stations. Dish said it would also install an antenna for qualifying customers in the impacted markets based on their available reception.

With the blackout, Dish subscribers in the 17 markets will not be able to access college football or NFL games that are set to air on Fox, as well as all other Fox station programming.

A full list of the markets affected by the blackout is available here.

NEW YORK & EL SEGUNDO, Calif.—Ending a blackout that lasted a little more than three weeks, CBS and AT&T have reached an agreement on a multi-year content carriage agreement to provide CBS-owned local broadcast stations and national channels, including CBS Sports Network and the Smithsonian Channel, to AT&T’s video platforms.

CBS stations went dark for AT&T’s DirecTV, DirecTV Now and U-Verse customers in 14 markets on July 20 after negotiations stalled between the two companies over retransmission fees. As a result of this new deal, the stations will return to all AT&T homes, including having local affiliates available for streaming on DirecTV Now, CBS Sports Network returning to DirecTV and DirecTV Now, and the Smithsonian Channel once again on DirecTV.

The new agreement covers 26 CBS stations in 17 markets, including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, San Francisco, Boston, Atlanta, Tampa, Seattle, Detroit, Minneapolis, Miami, Denver, Sacramento, Pittsburgh and Baltimore.

In a joint statement announcing the deal read: “CBS and AT&T regret any inconvenience to their customers and viewers and thank them for their patience.”

The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

This resolves one of the high profile retransmission disputes that AT&T was involved in. As of the time of publication, AT&T is still involved in negotiations with a group of Nexstar stations over carriage.

ENGLEWOOD, Colo.—Dish customers have been blacked out on 16 Fox regional sports networks since July 26, and according to the satellite provider’s chairman Charlie Ergen, customers could have to get used to those channels not being available through the service.

In a conference call discussing Dish’s Q2 results, Ergen highlighted where the two sides differ, with Dish calling the fees to carry the RSNs too expensive and Fox’s claim that they are simply seeking fair value for the content. Ergen would go on to say after a certain amount of time, customers may forget that the RSNs were even a part of the service to being with.

Read the full story on TVT’s sister publicationMultichannel News.

CHICAGO—Tribune Broadcasting pulled its TV stations from Charter Communications’ Spectrum cable system in 24 markets after the expiration of its contract on Wednesday. The action affects approximately six million viewers on 33 television stations.

Charter claims that Tribune is demanding more than double an increase in retransmission fees. Tribune says it is charging only what it considers “fair rates.” 

The dispute comes as the NFL begins playoffs this coming weekend. The league reported this week that viewership rose 5 percent in the 2018 season, with viewership averaging nearly 16 million viewers per game. Forty-six of the top 50 rated TV programs during the 2018 season were NFL games. 

“We don’t think it’s fair that they (Tribune Broadcasting) are demanding huge fee increases, especially since their programming is provided free with a TV antenna, and much of it is available for free on the internet.” Charter said in a statement.

"We're extremely disappointed that we do not have an agreement on the renewal of our contract with Spectrum," said Gary Weitman, Tribune Media's senior vice president for corporate relations. "We've offered Spectrum fair market rates for our top-rated local news, live sports and high-quality entertainment programming, and similarly fair rates for our cable network, WGN America," Weitman continued. "Spectrum has refused our offer and failed to negotiate in a meaningful fashion."

Stations affected by Charter’s actions include WPIX New York, KTLA Los Angeles, KDAF Dallas, and KSWB San Diego. WGNA America, the basic cable channel, also is affected.

Tegna-owned TV stations in three markets have gone dark on Verizon’s FiOS TV service as a dispute over retransmission fees continued into the new year. Norfolk, Va. ABC affiliate WVEC, DC CBS affiliate WUSA and Buffalo’s NBC affiliate WGRZ were all pulled from the FiOS lineup on Dec 31, 2018.

In a notice to subscribers, Verizon accused Tegna of proposing a significant rate increase for these stations. “The rising cost of programming is the single biggest factor in higher TV bills, and we are standing up to broadcasters like Tegna in order to protect you from rate increases,” Verizon said. “Rest assured, our goal is to reach a fair agreement that is in your best interest and allows you to continue to have access to the stations you enjoy today.”

In response Tegna said it has “worked hard to reach a fair, market-based agreement with Verizon” adding that it had “successfully reached hundreds of deals with cable and satellite providers across the country with no disruption of service, so we are disappointed we could not reach a deal with Verizon.

“We remain hopeful this will get resolved quickly. However, Verizon customers should know our channels remain available on every other service provider in their community as well as many over-the-top (OTT) providers, who offer instant access when viewers sign up,” Tegna continued. “Our station’s high-quality news, sports, weather and entertainment programming is also available for free over-the-air and viewers can continue watching our newscasts live on our stations’ apps.”

MONTEREY, CALIF.—Retransmission fees are on the rise, with S&P Global Market Intelligence division SNL Kagan estimating that U.S. TV station owners fees from multichannel operators could be $7.7 billion for 2016, a 20 percent increase from 2015’s $6.4 billion. Kagan projects that number could be as high as $11.6 billion by 2022.

In addition, reverse comp, which is the retrans money stations pay to their networks for programming, is also increasing. Per Kagan, reverse comp for 2016 looks to increase by 36 percent, to $2.1 billion.

Net affiliate retrans revenue is still expected to post annual growth in the high to low single digits over Kagan’s 10-year projection period. TV station owners generally staggered their retrans contracts with multichannel operators for renewal every three years, but affiliation agreements cover an average of four to five years, which gives station owners some visibility on net retrans until the next renewal.

Kagan projects that the average TV station’s retrans fee per subscriber per month will rise from $1.40 in 2016 to $2.21 in 2022. However, by 2019, the projected $10.1 billion in retrans fees would only be about 18.7 percent of the $53.9 billion that U.S. multichannel operators will pay to basic cable networks and regional sports networks.

2019’s average $1.87 retrans fee would put the U.S. TV station industry above all but three basic cable networks in terms of affiliate fees per subscription per month, trailing just ESPN ($9.17), TNT ($2.59) and Disney ($1.88), per Kagan. Most regional sports networks, however, are expected to be above the average retrans fee.