The profile of Radio Station owner Salem Broadcasting is complete. (at least version 1.0). Salem is most widely known for its Conservative Talk Radio network – Bennett, Gallagher, Prager, Medved and Hewitt and the townhall.com web site.
Nothing in the profile should be considered as investment advice.
It is presented here to help radio listeners get a better understanding of who runs the radio stations they listen to and how that affects issues involving Radio – like the push for Localism at the FCC and the economic problems facing radio.
Salem Broadcasting has been in the news recently. It’s of special interest to many visitors to this web site due to its role in conservative talk programming.
Like most in the radio business, it has been forced to write down the value of its radio station licenses. It is also facing a slump in advertising revenue due to the current economic conditions.
Salem has implemented a 5% pay cut and cut its work force by about 10% over the past year. Since the company used borrowed money to fund its acquisition of radio stations, it is at some risk of failing to meet the requirements of its lending contracts. If they go into technical default, the company could be taken over by the banks holding their loans. There is also a risk that those loans could then be dumped into the US Treasury or Federal Reserve “Toxic Asset” program. Salem is slashing costs to have a cushion to prevent that from happening.
Tim Geithner picking a future CEO for Salem would be a *very bad thing*.