In the middle of trying to save Sirius XM Radio Inc. from the dual specters of bankruptcy and an unsolicited takeover, Mel Karmazin is reportedly trying to renegotiate pricey programming deals with the likes of Oprah Winfrey, MLB and the NFL.
According to BusinessWeek, Karmazin is particularly bothered by the deal with Major League Baseball which costs his company $60 million a year.
As recently as last week, Karmazin met with top MLB officials in New York, including league COO Tim Brosnan, who negotiates television and radio deals. But talks didn't seem to have gone Karmazin's way. Brosnan only comment was, "We have a binding agreement that we intend to honor."
Executives from Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions were reportedly in New York recently to meet with Karmazin. According to BusinessWeek, Mel asked Oprah's gang about renegotiating their deal - which costs Sirius XM about $18 million a year, and expires in the fall of this year.
Also coming due this year is Martha Stewart's deal, for which Sirius XM pays the $7.5 million a year. But neither Martha or Oprah representatives comments to BusinessWeek's inquiries.
Additionally, according to the Boston Globe, Robert Kraft - chairman of the NFL's broadcast committee - recently paid a visit to Sirius XM headquarters to meet with Mel Karmazin as well as to "The Howard Stern Show."
Kraft also just happens to be on the Board of Directors of Viacom.
One issue for these content providers is that if Sirius XM does file for bankruptcy protection, many of their programming deals could be dismantled and the terms revised.
And that might cost the Oprah, Martha, the NFL and the MLB - among others - more than under a newly-revised plan.
[BusinessWeek]
Thanks @kevin_reiss!
As recently as last week, Karmazin met with top MLB officials in New York, including league COO Tim Brosnan, who negotiates television and radio deals. But talks didn't seem to have gone Karmazin's way. Brosnan only comment was, "We have a binding agreement that we intend to honor."
Executives from Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions were reportedly in New York recently to meet with Karmazin. According to BusinessWeek, Mel asked Oprah's gang about renegotiating their deal - which costs Sirius XM about $18 million a year, and expires in the fall of this year.
Also coming due this year is Martha Stewart's deal, for which Sirius XM pays the $7.5 million a year. But neither Martha or Oprah representatives comments to BusinessWeek's inquiries.
Additionally, according to the Boston Globe, Robert Kraft - chairman of the NFL's broadcast committee - recently paid a visit to Sirius XM headquarters to meet with Mel Karmazin as well as to "The Howard Stern Show."
Kraft also just happens to be on the Board of Directors of Viacom.
One issue for these content providers is that if Sirius XM does file for bankruptcy protection, many of their programming deals could be dismantled and the terms revised.
And that might cost the Oprah, Martha, the NFL and the MLB - among others - more than under a newly-revised plan.
[BusinessWeek]
Thanks @kevin_reiss!
The plot thickens...
That is too sad. The public wants music, not overpaid egos bragging about how great they are. Bring back the underpaid XM people!
They all need to go. MLB, in theory, made the most sense but in truth its a loser, baseball is in the toilet and most of the fans live in the cities where they play and can pick up the game on local radio. NFL and NBA, you can get that at any sports bar. Nascar, thats a complete waste of money, who is going to listen to roundyround on the radio.
NHL is probably required for Canada.
The only sports that makes any possible sense now are the college, and even they are not probably worth it.
And bankruptcy is the only way they are going to get out of those contracts, so if one owns shares one might as well plan on having a big tax writeoff.
A
arielsquarefour,
You are not thinking about iPhone sales worldwide. There are many sports fans around the world...
Why aren't they talking to Howard Stern and O & A?
Wait a minute... Mel is going to ask content providers to re-work their contracts, but he's not going to ask Howard to renegotiate his $100 million a year contract when he only works 4 days a week?
SatRad is dying and i am happy!
The Howard O&A bashing begins in...3...2...1
"That is too sad. The public wants music, not overpaid egos bragging about how great they are. Bring back the underpaid XM people!"
Agreed! Let's get back to basics. Most of us subscribed to XM for the music, first and foremost.
I disagree about MLB. It's a perfect fit for radio - whereas NASCAR and NFL are visual sports and are a destination having only 1 game/race per week. XM had the option of Stern for $550 Million over 5 years or MLB for $600 Million over 11 years. I'd go with MLB any day...I know Stern fans are more vocal (and less educated) than the MLB fans but I wouldn't underestimate what MLB on the radio does for SatRad.
Given the timing, the question is: Why are they renegotiating now? Has someone extended them a line of credit IF they can bring their costs down? Has someone offered to buy them for X amount for the same reason? Hmmm.
I believe that a majority of Opie and Anthony's contract is being paid by CBS Radio.
WE
SPEAK
YOUR
NAME!
"Bring back the underpaid XM people!"
Are you kidding me. Where do you think 3/4's of the debt came from.
I was attracted to XM Radio for the MLB initially - fell in love with the old XM music channels. Lifetime contract with them - hope they keep the baseball, get back to music stations the way they used to be (X Country, Vox, Beyond Jazz, etc.) and drop the crude humor big contracts and single-artist channels.
But it was baseball that got me originally. And, living on the East Coast, I love having Big Ten sports.
Just my 2 cents, which is all a share of satrad is worth these days....
If you are gong to spend big money to get people to your platform the spending of money on Oprah, Martha Stewart, Good Morning America, and any other boring ass thing is not going to bring subs.
You spend the big money on radio people. Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, Jim Rome, Don and Mike, and other big draws. Exclusive content is king and the content they have is crap.
I am not a Stern fan (prefer O&A and R&F) but I see the merits of Stern...I think the price was too high but he will bring a couple million with him so that is good.
I gotta disagree with dropping sports. I originally came to SatRad for the music, but found my time split between music, New/sports. In fact i think now more time may now be spent on the new/sports side of the dial.
I don't listen to many games on the radio, but I do listen to the actual NFL Channel, and MLB channel a lot. I would really hate to see them go.
The Music (out side the Dylan/Petty/ect shows) is replaceable. I can the music from Pandora or Slacker.
I listen to XM purely for the Music without commercials. I could go the iPod route-- except at 40+ I'm not part of the online-Music Search crowd. I want to hear new music without having to HUNT for it.
If XM sirius goes into bankruptcy, some of the stratosphere contracts should be jettisoned. Oprah has enough money. And maybe they should toss the coin on which of the sports broadcasts should take the axe.
But no matter how you dice it-- it's RADIO. Maybe it's time for the industry and it's investors to pare expectations down to reasonable levels. ie: shareholders shouldn't expect to become newly made millionaires every quarter.
Dammit-- it's just RADIO-- WITHOUT commercials!!
I like the Oprah channel. It's not like Oprah needs more money but, there are a lot of her people with talk shows on her channel and they need to be paid.
FU*K Baseball... The roid head, overpaid, teenagers won't negotiate... Dump them and don't pay.. I can hear every shit*y game the Pirates play right here in Pittsburgh, IF I wanted too. I wish baseball would die after all the steroid abuse.
Who really wants to hear Kansas City Royals at Seattle Mariners. JUNK.. Or Pittsburgh at the Cubs... JUNK Or the Cheating Yankees?? JUNK!
Also, the people that say the NFL is a visual sport are dummies or have never listened to SIRIUS 124.. There is NO off season..
Eff BASEBALL..
Baseball makes sense, many games are played when people are working and can't watch. It is also the only sport that is easy to follow. Some find MLB dull, but as the saying goes, Baseball is only dull to dull minds.
NFL? Who honestly listens to a game on the road other than truckers? 80% of the population is off on sundays and next to a TV. True fans do what it takes to be near a tv.
The only NFL channel that makes sense to keep is the talk channel.
And what about Howard? Why no renegotiation with him?
howard is out as of today
he did his last show today O&A you are next
Guys, you all are hilarious. Its not about "what is perfect" for radio. Its about what sells subscriptions. Hate Howard Stern if you want- but dollar for dollar- his deal probably made the most sense (although still overpriced).
MLB's deal is a joke. $60 million a year? Are you kidding me? Yes, baseball is "perfect for radio" but not at $60 million a year. Did it really sell that many subscriptions? And does it sell much in advertising? And Oprah's deal is the single biggest waste of money in sat. radio. How many radios did Oprah sell?
I doubt Mel will be able to renogotiate these deals, but I give him credit for trying.
That picture makes me want to punch her in the face. Over payed and worthless.
actually, unless it changed from the first structure, CBS pays XM for O&A.
Cancel Oprah and Martha. Tell the MLB and the NFL like it is. YOU (MLB/NFL) have to pay the cable campany's so eventually YOU (MLB/NFL) are going to have to pay US (the up and coming dominate medium) so lets talk equality here.
Smith steps up to the plate.
long pause
long pause
hears the pitch
long pause
long pause
he swings
yawn
yeah that is rivating audio right there.
Baseball is barely watchable on TV let alone listening to it on the radio.
No need to talk to Stern. Without him satellite radio would be nowhere.
As for Oral n Anal, I don't think they can afford to pay any more money to Sirius to broadcast that garbage.
Maybe Mel could eliminate the janitorial staff and employ those two trannies along with ron n pez.
There's year round NFL coverage on XM too dummy. The point is, you're basically paying for 1 day a week of games with football. And yes, football is a visual sport. MLB not so much.
I disagree with the arielsquarefour about MLB not worth for Sirius/XM Radio 1st off for people that don't live in the teams home town it's a good way to listen to the games on radio. whereas NASCAR and NFL are visual sports and are a destination having only 1 game/race per week. And disbite the roids conterversey I still love the game of baseball. It is our national pasttime.
They all need to go. MLB, in theory, made the most sense but in truth its a loser,...should we use this mentality with the music channels as well? They all need to go. Sirius hits 1 and XM pop2k, in theory made the most sense, but they are losers. baseball is in the toilet and most of the fans live in the cities where they play and can pick up the game on local radio...the music industry is in the toilet, and most of the fans of it live in cities where they can pick it up on local radio. NFL and NBA, you can get that at any sports bar...really? And what do the commentators say during the game? You must have superb hearing, as all I can hear are drunken shouts and profanity.
Nascar, thats a complete waste of money, who is going to listen to roundyround on the radio...but you can say that about any genre you dislike. Just substitute any genre name in that previous sentence.
Lol, your post is quite amusing. Here we have people who want more, and yet you, as a supposed satellite radio fan are advocating less for your money.
Football is a visual sport? Are you too dumb to listen and figure out what's going on? Football on the radio is great IMO. If I'm tailgating I want to be hearing what is going on in other games. And Sat Rad would be done if it weren't for HS. There is no reason to renegotiate his contract.
Alright Hank and everybody else who thinks this is the end of Sirius Radio:
All bankruptcy does is clear the massive debt that Mel owes to creditors. It also allows the re-negotiation of the high-dollar contracts. It actually allows Sat Rad to thrive and grow faster. It’s the shareholders like me that get wiped-out. But satellite radio will live on to push your commercial-infested, inane-chatter saturated, crap FM into the trash heap of the radio industry.
That's easy, fire Stern and Oprah, problem solved, company saved!
"Karmazin is particularly bothered by the deal with Major League Baseball which costs his company $60 million a year."
I guess not as bad as 100 million a year for one show.
Exactly gravy.... I WATCH my Steelers beat up on the Bungles and HEAR Baltimore losing to Cleveland on Sirius. It makes the season so interesting. Then all week I can LISTEN to all the players, coaches, analysts break it all down. Without the NFL channel I probably would STILL be a subscriber but, without Stern, I am gone.
Baseball:
Smith steps up to the plate.
long pause
long pause
hears the pitch
long pause
long pause
he swings
yawn..
EXACTLY!!
If you can't follow the NFL on radio you are R_E_T_A_R_D_E_D!!
Mel--reup Howie's K and double it. He's worth it. Arty too , eff U haters.
I have to disagree with you here. I am a former Philly native and I live in California now.
When the Phillies won the world series I was driving home from work and the only way I could observe the game was AM radio. (Sirius didn't have MLB)
trust me that was anything but boring....
Steelers fan, enough said. Your posting and thinking with your heart, not your brain. Fact is millions love baseball, maybe not you, and I know for fact that over 25% of XM (pre merger) subscribers polled indicated they joined specifically for MLB coverage. I worked for XM so yes, I do know. So, the point is to have that kind of growth over 11 years is a solid investment and would take that over a 5 year deal. What do you do when those 5 years are up? Stern's got all the leverage in the world and you'll end up overpaying even more if that's possible. Let's not forget XM originally balked at the Stern deal for MLB which forced Sirius to go for Stern to remain relevant.
I find Stern amusing but his draw to satellite has been WAY overblown.
Howard is an old woman who gets his hair done at the parlor.
Just saying...
Ron & Fez, noon to 3.
for a poster above that said you can get the NFL in any bar, the NFL channel is the ONLY reason I have five subs and unfortunately one of the reasons I own 80k shares at a much higher PPS. The NFL contract is a big deal and if you heard the people who call into that show they all have Sirius only for the NFL angle. If they loose it Im gone.
I signed up for XM for the baseball. I love the baseball talk MLB Home Plate channel. And for those of you that think baseball is a dead sport, millions of people go to baseball games and watch on television.
And just because YOU don't like it, doesn't mean it shouldn't be on satellite radio. I can make that same argument about 60% of what's on satellite radio. It is what it is. Deal with it.
Hmmmm....
I don't remember any news shows, Fox, CNBC or any newspapers like Wall Street Journal praising Howard for being the reason why satellite is still in existence.
Howard is a 500 million dollar risk that Sirius took to stay afloat. Yes, he brought listeners, but satellite being nowhere without him?
I listened to XM for 5 years now (O and A party rock!) and don't remember saying "Thank God for Howard, otherwise I would be able to listen to satellite radio"
So I guess this means Riley Martin won't be getting a raise any time soon? The Biavians will be so disappointed.
Howard brought a lot of subscribers to Sirius and they'll leave in droves if he leaves the service. And he doesn't only broadcast one show - he has two channels with a variety of programming. Sure, some of it is a joke - Riley, John the Stutterer - but there's a lot of good stuff from people like Ferrel, Greg Fitzsimmons, Lisa Lampanelli and more. Bubba, too, although I don't really care for him.
Hate him all you want but don't deny his very important role in the evolution of satellite radio. Without him, nobody would even be talking about satellite.
Oh, and for anybody that thinks Howard doesn't deliver results for Sirius:
"David Kestenbaum, an analyst with Morgan Joseph & Co. said the only deal that either firm made that led to enough subscriber growth to pay for itself was the one with Howard Stern.
'Someone will make a lot of money off this company when you eliminate the debt and restructure the programming contracts that are not viable," Kestenbaum said. "Howard Stern is the exception. He's worth it.'"
If you're going to renegotiate something I say you renegotiate the merger and either give XM shareholders fair value (hard to do, since Sirius has not one damned thing to offer) OR just undo it altogether. That's it. Un-merge.
No, I guess not. But we can dream.
It is pretty funny, though, given that Mel was SOOOOO sure he would be glad to give Stern a new contract at the same price as before.
What I don't understand is how could The Genius, Karmazin, NOT have seen this coming?
We had all these guys posting over here telling us how bright Karmizan was. Where is that guy -- MUSCLE? He was so sure Mel was going to solve the world's problems.
NAB and cronies are the only ones that would be glad if SATRAD died... but check this out... IT AIN'T GOING TO HAPPEN! Bankruptcy would just give them a cleaner slate to build on their 20million subs. Terrestrial radio is going the way of the dinosaur and soon all we will see are the fossilized remains.
Howie is safe - as much as it pains me to say as an O&A fan, he definitely brought a large number of people to Siri-XM, at least initially - I do not entirely pin the full Sirius surge on him, but he definitely helped. However, no matter what he did for the company in the past, the surge he brought is most certainly over, and he does not deserve the $80 million per year he is getting - if he is unwilling to negotiate down to something semi-sane, he's gonna be walking (finally letting us see if he's all talk about whether he really wants to retire).
But O&A are safe too - despite what the haters think, O&A probably has been the more profitable of the shock jocks up to this point, because A) they've never demanded anywhere near the ridiculous rates Howie wanted, B) CBS has been paying a significant amount of their contract for several years now to share the show, C) XM's SAC was a lot lower than Sirius's when the Howie run-up began, and D) Opie has been alluding that their newest contract already showed the signs of SIRI's belt-tightening - Mel has plenty of bigger fish to worry about before he can even think about caring about the boys.
When it comes to Oprah and Martha, I guarantee that either one of them gets kicked to the street, or they throw them together on a split channel with a much more reasonable deal. Frankly, they should be reduced to having at most a few hours a week tops on Sirius XM Stars (AKA Dry Cunt Radio as I have taken to calling it) - neither of these twats have enough swing to be worth wasting two whole channels of bandwidth.
MLB is a bit hazier - I can see them refusing to budge until/unless bankruptcy is filed, and even then basically giving Siri-XM the opportunity to bail on the contract with no strings attached - if Mel wants the MLB, he's probably gonna have to pay what they're paying now.
NFL might be more willing to shave a bit, and I'm sure Mel can talk down NASCAR and the PGA a bit. The college conferences, while big and mean, I'm sure can be pared back a bit - let's face it, most of those are almost guaranteed money losers for Siri-XM and the colleges would probably rather get a small amount of cash for it instead of nothing.
Note that none of this belt-tightening is gonna save this sinking ship at this point - even if they make a deal that will let them self-sufficiently pay and keep Mel in control, the May debt is going to need another miracle, and at this point, that just isn't going to happen. We're going to see either bankruptcy or a Echostar ot Liberty-owned Siri-XM soon, and I'm not sure that would be a bad thing.
I can imagine that one of the game 5's that were played was entertaining. (I was at Saturady, Monday and Wednesday's games) it was great but throughout the season baseball is boring to listen to. I understand that some can't go or SEE a game but Cable GETS PAID to broadcast content and SiriusXM has to PAY for it. Very WRONG in my opinion.
fyi:
howard brought enough subscribers that his contract is not in danger.
sirius/xm needs MLB, NFL, NHL, NASCAR.
canada sirius is a totally separate company.
I'm pissed that they stopped playing music that contained 'foul language' on most of their channels. at first they played edited versions, but the outcry was enormous. their response was to just remove such songs from the playlists. that sucked.
(Yawn) Bring back the XM channels with their deep playlists, FIRE all the "on-air talent" (especially the motormouth Sirius DJ's), put back the cute bumpers like LUCY used to have and guess what? Very low cost, LOTS of HAPPY subs! NAH! too practical for an idiot from terrestial FM (MK).
New article please - tired of looking at Oprah
@Libb - I think you were going good there for a minute.
Oprah is probably the best deal of the lot -- reasonable cost, excellent ad revenue, and great connections with REAL advertisers rather than dick extensions.
Stern is going to be history. He cannot possibly bring himself -- with his massive ego -- to take the pay cut that would be required to keep him going. They'll probably phase him out and and bring in some newby.
No reason for O&A to leave. They're not making big bucks anyway.
The bankruptcy gets them out from under these OEM deals, which is good. The OEMs want sat radio as an option by now, I'd think. So there is no reason Xm and SIRI ought to be paying big money for the placement.
SXMInvester, You can look at that monstrocity? I sure as hell can't! Freaking HEINOUS !!!
We have a battle with Mel, Ergen and Liberty and this is the top article that this site can come up with.
Tomorrow friday the 13th, all this coming to a head going into a long weekend with debt due on Tuesday.
Come-on Ryan ! Give us something better to bite into, some analysis.
Howard Stern is the only untouchable on Satellite Radio. He brought in the subscriptions that in the end is what counts. He is satellites number 1 salesperson. No renegotiation, in fact a raise after 5 years is due.
I predict by the end of the year this party is over and we can all go back to i pods and Slacker, and FM radio.
like, maybe something about the siriusbuzz.com story on bankruptcy options and the ability for Mel to sell off, bankrupt, just XM and have no effect on Sirius, or it's shareholders?
im scared this is the calm before the storm, who know whats going to happen in this next couple days
The Oprah channel is garbage - what in Gayle King's background makes anyone think that she is a radio personality? Just because she has been dryhumping her best friend Oprah's leg for 20 years doesn't mean she belongs on radio. Terrible programming. There are plenty of great radio people out there who could have been gotten for a tenth of the price of Oprah and her crowd of no talents, new agers, and mentally unbalance mystic wackos.
failboat set to sail
""It's the best of both worlds," said Greg "Opie" Hughes. "We wanted to do this 18 months ago, when we heard Howard was leaving, but unfortunately CBS was still a little too scared of us. They had to fail miserably to see things our way."
guess so
Opie offers another explanation for their sudden success: "It just shows there's nothing to listen to. How starved were these people?"
starved?20 + markets ..poof gone!
"We're happy to be in this position, it's the best of our careers," said Cumia. "A couple of years back, I never thought I'd be saying that. Our goal is to make what we call the greatest comeback in radio history."
bwhahahahahahhahahhahahahahha
"dont call it a comback"
e and Anthony thanked CBS for bringing them back "and giving us another chance," though Opie had one addendum to that.
"Who are we kidding?" he said. "CBS had no choice."
What about $100mil/year Howard? that was an INSANE contract to sign. I think the problem is that he's a BIG shareholder with the company?
Run the numbers, folks. Figuring that the average =paying= (and that distinction is vital) SXM customer has about two active units each (many with only one, but enough others with several more that it likely balances out).
That means that every paying customer is worth $250/yr to the SXM bottom line.
That means that every programming option whose loss would generate cancellations has a benefit -- or, rather, a stop-loss -- of $250*X number of projected cancelled subs.
If, for instance, losing Martha Stewart's programming is projected to cause 40 000 cancellations (a ludicrous number, I agree), then renewing her contract for something less than $10M/yr prevents additional losses.
Let's run the numbers for MLB now. At $60M/yr, losing baseball would have to project slightly less than a quarter-million cancellations (240K, to be as close to "exact" as I'm gonna be) to actually =hurt= the bottom line. That sounds like a bunch, doesn't it? Well, it's only about 1 out of every 77 subs. If SXM =only= lost every 77th sub after booting MLB, I know I'd be surprised.
And then there's Howard.
No, he doesn't take home $100M/yr. (A huge chunk of his compensation came early on in stock, stock which trading volume shortly after its issuance has been said by analysts to indicate he immediately cashed it in.)
But, what if he did?
SXM would have to be projecting that losing Howard would cost them fewer than 400K subs.
Which is utterly preposterous. We've all seen the sudden "hockey stick" growth spurt Sirius experienced in the run up to Howard's exclusivity and his first several months on the sats. His departure would turn at =least= 1M accounts dark. And that would trim $250M/yr off the bottom line.
So even if he did make $100M/yr -- heck, if he made twice that -- he'd be a bargain.
To the over 40 dude, if you have Sirius for music you are crazy. Streaming music will kill sirius. To everyone caliming the only alternitive is FM you are worng. Just this morning driving into work I listened to O & A out of NY (Howard is off AGAIN 100 mil a year and he is part time), Danny in philly, a music sation from my old home town, NPR, CNN and then some tunes I have on my iPhone. The choices are unlimitted now.
Ykw, the analysis you present seems accurate and logical. However, it does not take into account the fact that if you buy subscribers with high-cost programming like MLB and Howard Stern -- in which you make only a little bit of money, if you're lucky, on the margin between the price you pay for the programming and the number of subscribers who don't cancel because you continue to deliver it -- how do you pay for satellites, front office people, Mel's hefty bonuses, the rest of the executives and employees, lights, etc?
Programming can't represent that high a percentage of what they're spending, because there are too many other expenses.
I like baseball, but as far as the MLB, the thing I've always thought is it's a fairly narrow niche they're trying to serve -- baseball fans who follow some team other than the home team (which is always available on terrestrial radio in the home market and surrounding areas), or fans who are traveling and can't catch the game on the usual station.
A couple other considerations: These channels also carry a "lost opportunity" cost: By broadcasting baseball or Howard Stern, they can't broadcast something else that someone who does not like those things might like -- something that could cost far less. Also, baseball and Howard Stern do have advertising, which might somewhat offset their cost.
I, and many others have XM ONLY for baseball. If it goes, we all go...
XM promoted the baseball coverage so heavily for so long that it would be almost inconceivable for them to drop it entirely.
The sports leagues and franchises may be pricing themselves out of the market, however. They seem to forget that they need media coverage just about as much as the media need them. Rather than exacting multi-million dollar upfront payments from the media, it would be fairer if they could enter into a cooperative arrangement where they divvy up the revenue the broadcasts generate.
What about Ellis. He's the only reason I have kept SAT radio I will keep listening as long as Faction stays on the air. WAR ELLIS
Stern saved sirius this is FACT.
but XM is proof enough that you can get 10m without stern.
problem is that stern will be at least a 2m hit based on arbitron ratings which this company cannot afford
MLB, Martha, Ophra, other sports = Not worth the deals
Stern = cut at least by 50%....remind the jew that he gets 0.00 in bankruptcy.
but out of everyone stern has the best option but for as much as he brags i doubt he really is ready to retire or go back to regular radio
lets be honest for a second you Howard haters......Lets just say for the sake of argument he only brought over 1 million listeners......even though we all know it is more then that, but lets just say it's a million at 13 dollars a month which is 13 million $ a month. Times that by 12 months a year and you have 156 million dollars a year delivered by stern listeners. A 56 million dollar profit
Add into it that originally, those listeners had to by a radio at an average of 80 dollars, and that means Stern's first Year he brought in 236 million dollars. Thats quite the profit for Sirius the first year he was around.
Also, It's more then a million folks he brought in, so these numbers are low......he is one of the few that is earning his keep