U.S. TV Station Owners’ Retrans Fees to Reach $9.3 Billion by 2020

MONTEREY: SNL Kagan has revised its retransmission fee projections, now forecasting U.S. station owners' retrans fees to reach $9.3 billion by 2020, versus the previous forecast of $4.9 billion this year.

The projections for growth are based on rising per-month sub fees for TV station owners in recent negotiations, as well as a new set of expectations for what broadcast networks are asking in programming compensation from their affiliates. SNL Kagan’s projections call for retrans revenues to rise to $8.78 billion by 2019, versus their 2019 projection of $7.64 billion from last year.

The average $1.32 retrans fee that SNL Kagan anticipates the industry will receive by 2017 across all markets and all affiliates puts TV stations above all but five basic cable networks in terms of affiliate fees per subscriber per month. Networks such as ESPN ($7.72) and TNT ($1.92) are all still above that average mark.