BREAKING
According to theflyonthewall:

09:59 EDT XMSR theflyonthewall.com: XM Satellite Radio-XMSR trading higher on take-over speculation-Rumor :theflyonthewall.com

09:57 XMSR XM Satellite: rumor of CBS for XMSR; price talk said to be $27 (21.92 +0.12)

More on this as news develops.
Note: this should be considered a rumor until we find out more.

UPDATE: This from Briefing.com: 

Hearing CBS-for-XMSR chatter making rounds

UPDATE 2: More from Briefing.com:

by: ubscibc

BRF 10:33 XMSR: XM Satellite: Color on takeover chatter [UPDATE]

[Live In Play]

XMSR: XM Satellite: Color on takeover chatter (22.20 +0.40)
[Update]
Following takeover rumors in XMSR today (with CBS cited as a potential buyer... see 9:58 comment), we listened to yesterday's CBS conference call for any possible insight. During the call, CBS was asked directly about Univision (UVN), and their response was "I think Univision is a great company but there are two major issues for us. One is valuation and the other is regulation... other than that it is a wonderful asset." Co stated that they did not think they could clear the first hurdle... Approx 5 minutes later co was asked what they would do with their free cash. Co stated that they want to pay dividend; thinks that it is a higher threshold of confidence and best use of cash; says they would like to keep increasing the dividend. Co also stated that they are not interested in a large acquisition -- say in the $12-13 bln range -- but could be interested in a smaller acquisition in the $300 mln range (i.e. College Sports TV) that would be fairly valued and would fill a void for the co. Says acquisition has to be attractive and be able to grow... Briefing.com
Note: Given yesterday's comments by CBS, with a market cap of approx $5 bln it would not appear that XMSR would fall into the acquisition profile that CBS is interested in.

Briefing.com, Inc.

UPDATE 3: Gary Parsons at the BofA MET Conference stated that he "certainly" wouldn't comment on this rumor.

Reports are coming in from all over the place that the Samsung Helix and Pioneer Inno release date has be pushed back to early May. The initial word was that Helix/Inno would be hitting the shelves in late-March / early-April, but if these reports are true it looks like we'll all have to wait a little longer.

theflyonthewall is apparently also reporting this:

March 23, 2006
08:07 EDT XMSR theflyonthewall.com: XM Satellite Radio-XMSR target lowered to $38 from $44.16-Buy@OPCO
The firm checks indicate that it's unclear whether XMSR's new MP3 players will be at retail by April as expected. OPCO feels a delay could reflect a either a technical glitch or the company's negotiations with music labels. :theflyonthewall.com

Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

UPDATE: The only official word I have on this is:

"The products will be shipping soon with significant quantities available for the second quarter."

Let's leave this chalked up as a rumor, but apparently Eric Logan just teased on the air that
a channel rhyming with "kettle" will be announced on Thursday... which could only mean one channel in my mind: XM Liquid Metal!

Remember that in the beginning of the month, I was told that a "legendary" channel will be making a return to the XM Satellites. Sources have also mentioned that Special X will most likely not be part of the return. Also note that a bulletin was sent out earlier this month stating that new XM music channels will be coming in April, so that might give us a hint into timing.

Let's see what we hear on Thursday. 

Thanks Rev! 

While perusing through my XM trademark search I stumbled upon this filing by XM for "XM4Home". Judging by the date, this has been in the works for sometime now, but as usual, the listing provides little details of what this thing actually does. Anyway, here's the info:

Registered Trademark (Link)

Word Mark XM4HOME
Goods and Services IC 009. US 021 023 026 036 038. G & S: digital audio radio receivers, antennas and components
Standard Characters Claimed
Mark Drawing Code (4) STANDARD CHARACTER MARK
Design Search Code
Serial Number 78691500
Filing Date August 12, 2005
Current Filing Basis 1B
Original Filing Basis 1B
Owner (APPLICANT) XM Satellite Radio Inc. CORPORATION DELAWARE 1500 Eckington Place NE Washington D.C. 20002
Attorney of Record Cynthia Greer
Prior Registrations 2547677;2902875;3016015;AND OTHERS
Type of Mark TRADEMARK
Register PRINCIPAL
Live/Dead Indicator LIVE

So sparking my curiosity, I dig back into a Bear Stearns report outlining the analysts tour of XM R&D facility in Florida from earlier this month and find this nugget on upcoming XM devices:

Next generation home-based receivers likely would also support wireless networks and solutions that are becoming increasingly popular.

So the XM4HOME receiver could be a wirelessly connected device that streams satellite radio content to other devices, possible through 108.11b/g WiFi. But then the "solutions that are becoming increasingly popular" still leaves room for more speculation.

Turning to Bank of America's report of the same XM analyst tour, we may find a bit more clues:

Other new services/products include weather, voice controls, and ability to transmit data to devices (ie podcast, audio books).

Now, we know about weather and voice controls. So what about the ability to transmit data like podcasts and audio books? Note in the trademark filing that it says "digital audio radio receivers" and not "satellite radio receivers" as normally listed.

I could speculate like crazy about what the final functionality of this device is, but I'll leave that up to you guys. If the XM2go is any indication, XM4Home would be a more "revolutionary" concept in how satellite radio is looked at as a home entertainment category.

(Note: That's the Polk XRT-1 pictured above just to give a visual reinforcement.)

As speculation abounds, today's show did nothing but to fuel the frenzy of questions. Apparently allaccess.com is reporting (via XM411 - thanks Barry!):

CBS: O&A "Not Returning"
So, are OPIE AND ANTHONY going back to CBS RADIO? A spokesperson for CBS tells ALL ACCESS flatly that "O&A are not returning to CBS RADIO," responding to OPIE's prankish reference to rumors at the NEW YORK RADIO MESSAGE BOARD that "the rumors are true ... ALLEN (NYRMB operator SNIFFEN) got it right."

That's the only "official" word from CBS Radio that I've heard. My own attempts to contact CBS Radio have been fruitless, but normally as the NY Daily News reports, CBS Radio does not comment on rumors.

So what from the XM camp? The official word from XM Satellite Radio is:

"There’s no present plan to have O & A syndicated."

Take that anyway you want, Allan Sniffen is still sticking to his guns on this one.

Rumor has it that Opie and Anthony are possibly replacing David Lee Roth in "multiple markets." While this definitely should be considered just a rumor I would like to point out that this is not the first time O&A would be syndicated to terrestrial radio. They did so for a short amount of time, replacing Howard Stern I might add, over a year ago.

Very interesting. This on the heals of Roth's little rant this morning about his CBS Radio bosses.

Thanks Brian! 

Analysts from Bank of America and Bear Stearns have both brought up in recent reports that the next-generation XM2go units (Samsung Helix and Pioneer Inno) might be getting a bump in storage space in the coming future.

These new XM2go units - shipping later this month - will first be coming with 1Gb of storage space. Now, even though XM's compression is 3x as as efficient as Apple's AAC standard, supposedly the flash storage may be seeing an increase to 2Gb or more.

No word on whether a harddrive based Satellite Radio/MP3 device will be seeing the light of day anytime soon. While the timeframe is unknown, Bank of America believes these bigger, badder XM2gos may hit the market for the Holiday Season.

But until something more concrete comes by, let's file this away as a "rumor" just to be safe.

Thanks to a loophole in US copyright law, satellite radio recorders are the next big legal battleground - with Apple believed to be in the advanced stages of adding satellite streams as podcasts to its iTunes store.

"It's a great example of how you can lose it all for everyone if you set out to gain an extra cent for yourself," said Kenswil.