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i can't believe these satellite radio stations are still in business.
By PETER LAURIA
February 19, 2008 -- Sirius and XM Satellite Radio shareholders are betting the companies' merger will be approved imminently; then again, that has been the case since November.
The spread between Sirius and XM shares is at its tightest since the merger was announced precisely one year ago today, meaning investors are buying into last week's market chatter that the Department of Justice is set to approve the deal.
According to one source familiar with the situation, junior Justice officials were given one last chance to make their case against approval - known as "last rights" - to An rust Division Chief Thomas Barnett before he signs off on the deal.
The spread between Sirius and XM shares is a telling indicator of whether the market thinks the deal will ultimately be approved or not.
The spread is based on a mathematical calculation involving the two companies' stock prices and the number of Sirius shares exchanged for one XM share. The wider the spread, the less a chance of approval; the tighter the spread, the better the odds.
Before Friday's close, the tightest the spread had been since the merger announcement was $1.50; the widest was $2.50. But based on Sirius' closing price of $3.23 per share Friday and XM's closing price of $13.56, the spread is now a miniscule $1.30.
"We believe the stock prices of XM and Sirius have re-entered an 'imminent approval' bubble," wrote Goldman, Sachs analyst Mark Wienkes in a report last week.
Shareholders of both companies, who have already approved the merger, have been expecting a green light from the government department since November. And while talk is that a ruling could come within days, there is no deadline for a decision.
Approval hinges on several factors: whether the Justice Department and the Federal Communications Commission believe XM and Sirius compete only with each other or, as the companies contend, with terrestrial radio, iPods and other audio entertainment devices.
Most Wall Street analysts think the merger will be approved with conditions, such as removing all "indecent" programming from the basic package, freezing prices for a limited time and making interoperable radios, said Stifel Nicolaus analyst Blair Levin.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/02192008..._air_98330.htm
i can't believe these satellite radio stations are still in business.
Thank god that they are.
Satellite radio is the greatest. having to listen to 20 minutes of commercials just to hear the same songs they play on all the other stations. And thanks to Sirius, I now have a reggae station I can listen to all day.
And there is nothing like uncensored Howard.
I wish this fricking merger will go through already. I have stock in Sirius and while it hasn't done anything, I know if I dump it now it will go through the roof if I do.
Midge, did you hear when Jim Cramer was on Howard talking about the merger? It's ridiculous why this is being held up.
Sat radio is sheer greatness.
No FCC filtered garbage and they play real music. Not crap like Nickleback and Paris Hilton songs 4 times an hour.
No comemrcials (SIRIUS)
They play Nickelback alot on Sirius.Not crap like Nickleback and Paris Hilton songs 4 times an hour.
Never heard it once...had it for years.
So again..if I want to hear real music...I can avoid crap like that.
A "real" music.
Good thing your here to show me wich is real music and wich isn't.
He's right though, nickleback sucks and is pretty gay to boot.
May be. Peewee just put me in a ed up mood for creating arguements where they aren't though.
Sorry Evan.
Just a matter of taste. No offense if you like Nickleback!
I always use them as an example as to why I hate regular radio because what drove me to buy sat in the first place was hearing that song "Photograph" and Ashlee Simpson seemingly several times an hour on every station I turned on a few years ago.
Another part of the greatness of sat radio...ultra variety for all flavors!
No worries!
I hope it goes through, my new car has XM and it f'ing sucks ass. I tried to hook up my Sirius but the FM transmitter sucks thanks to the NAB and FCC working together.
I can't even listen to regular radio. I'm pissed that I'm driving down the road and can't listen to Howard or Left of Center
TD, your new car doesn't have an AUX input (Don't know if the Sirius unit has a headphone output)?
Speaking of Sirius...we got my son a Stiletto for his birthday. Besides the rather large and uncomfortable headphones, he could not get any reception in the house unless it was by certain windows and even then it was iffy.
We ended up returning it.
How much do you think Sirius stock will rise after this merger?
Yes, the standard FM transmitter sucks... but here's something that might help, but I haven't personally tried it yet. When I bought my car kit for my Stiletto, it came with a separate FM cable that supposedly enhanced the signal, so you might want to see if you can buy the cable by itself.
Funny related story: For my XM, I have the very old Roady 2. XM sent me an adapter to weaken the signal, but I threw it out rather than attach it to the cable. Anyway, last day of the baseball regular season last season, my friend Adam and I were driving two cars from The Woodlands to San Marcos (we're both huge baseball fans).
Since Adam knows the way, he's ahead of me... I didn't know until about 3/4 of the way there that he was listening to whatever baseball I kept listening to. He said right after we left, he started scrolling through the stations and came across baseball and said WTF.
I've noticed that, too... what I did during my trip last weekend to Houston (and since I had to use the ty FM receiver since the truck I used didn't have a tape or audio input), I would leave it on my favorite station and Love whatever songs came on that I liked... that way, I could store up the 10 hours of radio on my library.
Granted, I know your son probably doesn't have a car yet, either.
for most cars with XM built in, you can get a converter kit to change it to Sirius. Might be worth checking out.
Not yet!
Sirius really needs to improve that. The kids are allowed to listen to music at lunch and he couldn't even get any reception there either. Very disappointing.
Outside? Well, I know there's a lot of trees there, but that shouldn't make a difference.
I can see where the Stiletto wouldn't be of much benefit to him... , an iPod would work wonders and at least he'd have a much larger library to choose from. I ended up getting a great deal on a 4GB microSD card and went with that.
No, in the cafeteria. iPod is fine, but he wanted the a gazillion gig iTouch. Not gonna happen...
Yeah I listened to that. It is bull why this merger is being held up. I also found it interesting when they mentioned other big companies like Exxon-Mobile, ATT-Cingular, and Texaco-S mergers all went through in less time than this merger. And to say there wouldn't be any compe ion is just a ridiculous argument.
Yeah if you don't have a antenna fixed to a Window facing North you can forget about a signal with SIRIUS.
Plus both companies have basically frozen developing new technology now.
The common theory is SIRIUS has better content and XM has better equipment.
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