George Soros Snaps Up Media Stocks Comcast, Tivo, Time Warner

Veteran investor and hedge fund mogul George Soros of Soros Fund Management LLC has made some key changes to the fund portfolio as per the latest disclosure with SEC. The Hungarian-born octogenarian has ramped up his $4.2 billion fund’s stake in Comcast Corporation (Nasdaq: CMCSA), TiVo Corporation (Nasdaq: TIVO), and Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX).

The legendary hedge fund manager and self-made billionaire launched Soros Fund Management in 1970. He went on to become one of the most successful investors in the history of the United States and famously made an investment profit of U.S. $1 billion during the 1992 Black Wednesday crisis in U.K. As a result, he earned the name ‘The Man Who Broke the Bank of England’.

Soros survived Nazi occupation in 1944-45 as a teenager in Hungary and later fled to England. There he studied philosophy at the London School of Economics under Karl Popper. He moved to New York City in the 1950s to work for F.M. Mayer. After working as analyst and trader at various firms, he finally founded Soros Fund Management. In more recent years Soros formed the Open Society Foundations (OSF), which manages the network of Soros Foundations that are involved in philanthropic activities all over the world.

Let’s now take a closer look at Soros’ latest investment decisions.

Comcast Corporation (CMCSA)

Soros boosted the fund’s stake in Comcast by a whopping 100% in Q3 up to $41.73 million. However, this holding has since dropped by 6.5% in value from the last filing. Comcast Corporation is currently the largest broadcasting and cable television company in the world by revenue.

The cable giant is currently rumored to be in talks with 21st Century Fox about buying its movie studio. Interestingly, Comcast is trying to purchase the same bundle of assets that Disney had talked to Fox about earlier this year. Comcast already owns the multibillion-dollar broadcast rights to the Olympics through NBCUniversal and has invented a new Xfinity cable interface last year specifically designed for the Rio Games. However, there are also clear headwinds like the increasing onslaught of subscription streaming alternatives leading to a drop in subscribers, and a lot of long-term debt.

Despite these challenges, most on the Street see value in Comcast. TipRanks analytics show CMCSA as a Strong Buy. Out of 12 analysts polled in the last 3 months, 11 are bullish on Comcast stock while 1 remains sidelined. With a return potential of nearly 23.36%, the stock’s consensus target price stands at $44.20.

TiVo Corporation (TIVO)

The hedge fund guru bumped up its stock in digital video recorder maker TiVo Corporation by 4.69%. The fund’s position is now worth $103 million.

After the successful Rovi – TiVo merger in September 2016, the two leading players in the media entertainment industry with complementary products and services have become the joint global leader in entertainment technology and audience insights. The new TiVo has a diverse product portfolio that ranges from interactive program guide to DVR. The combined company has emerged as the world’s leading media and entertainment provider to deliver the ultimate entertainment experience. Yet, the competitors for the company are also aplenty, especially Internet video providers such as Alphabet’s YouTube, Netflix Inc., Apple, and Roku.

Soros’s attitude toward the stock currently aligns with investor sentiment on the Street, considering that all the 4 analysts polled in the last 12 months are bullish on TiVo stock. With a return potential of 48.57%, the stock’s consensus target price stands at $26.

Time Warner Inc. (TWX)

Soros lifted his hedge fund’s holding in media and entertainment conglomerate Time Warner by 70.76% to a total of $104.5 million. Following the move, TWX is now one of the top 5 stocks of the fund portfolio, at 2.48%.

Recently leaked reports suggest trouble for the proposed $85 billion merger of AT&T and Time Warner that was announced over a year ago. The Department of Justice had announced that it is suing to block AT&T’s merger with the media giant. The DOJ says the megamerger would be harmful to consumers. This has caused a selling spree of the TWX stock currently.

The majority of analysts are currently sidelined on the stock. TipRanks shows TWX has a Hold analyst consensus. This breaks down into 3 buy and 10 hold ratings in the last three months. Analysts are predicting upside of 16.75% for the stock, which is currently trading at $102.40.

Disclaimer: TipRanks is an independent cloud based service that measures and ranks digitally published financial advice. TipRanks' natural language processing (NLP) algorithms aggregate and ...

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