Cable Stocks Continue New Year's Slide

Comcast Eyed as Possible Suitor for The Weather Channel

By Jon Hemingway -- Broadcasting & Cable, 1/3/2008 1:10:00 PM

Cable stocks continued to trade heavy Thursday after finishing lower in the first trading day of the year. Both Comcast and Cablevision Systems traded through their 52-week lows.

Comcast hit a session low of $17.13 per share Thursday morning, well through the previous 52-week low of $17.37. The company was fingered in an article in The New York Times Thursday morning as a possible bidder for The Weather Channel, which is on the block and could demand as much as $5 billion, according to the story. News Corp. and NBC Universal were also mentioned as possible buyers.

Cablevision -- which also owns programming assets but was not associated with the TWC news -- was also carving out a new 52-week low of $22.68 per share. It hit the low mark late Thursday morning and since bounced back up over $23 through midday.

The rest of the sector was trading lower, as well. Time Warner Cable was down more than 3% midday at $26.58 per share; Charter Communications slipped over 2.5% to $1.11; and Mediacom Communications gave up some of Wednesday’s gains by sliding 1.7% to $5.18.