“The appetite for financial news is changing,” admits CNN’s Ken Jautz, head of the floundering CNNfn. “People are less focused on the stock market. There are fewer people out there who are interested in minute-to-minute coverage.”
Jautz says that any network that has built up programming around daytraders has to be doing some serious rejiggering at the moment. CNNfn, for one, is shifting its focus in the after-business hours to personal finance. They’re hoping that programming will appeal to the “informed investor” rather than the professional one. The network, which pioneered covering Wall Street like a contact sport, also just rehired white-haired Lou Dobbs. The 19-year vet of CNN will once again anchor “Moneyline.”
“We’ll cover the stock market in a way that gives people the long-term context,” says Jauntz. “You’ll see a lot less for the daytrader and more for regular people.”
Most agree that CNBC is the most vulnerable of the other financial news networks. The channel led the pack during the bull run-and emerged as the leading financial news TV network. With shows like “Squawk Box” and “Market Wrap,” the network embodied-and critics say, promoted-the gold rush mentality that gripped the nation until late last year. Reporting Wall Street rumors, stock hype and a detailed play-by-by of Nasdaq’s girations, CNBC became the prestige interview for the Wall Street CEO and the network of choice for the daytrader.
Still, CNBC executives believe their audience won’t shrink along with the Dow. “We don’t see people losing interest in the market,“said Paul Capelli, spokesman for the network. “People want to know what to do in a market like this, how to make money and how to preserve it.”
The numbers back him up-for now. As the stock market has dropped, CNBC’s ratings have dipped slightly and leveled off. Executives there are quick to point out that ad sales are still strong, though admittedly, not as strong as they were last year. (CNBC’s ad dollar growth was 243 percent from 1996 to 2000.)
CNBC’s competitors, such as Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes, happily predict that CNBC’s ratings will continue to drop.
“People don’t want to hear bad news all day,” said Ailes, who once worked for CNBC. “Financial television must appeal to Main Street, not Wall Street,” he says. He also points out that Fox’s Neil Cavuto, host of that network’s finance-themed “Your World,” has long taken that approach.
At the same time, though, Ailes is also hedging his bets. He’s trying a different strategy on weekends, beefing up programming aimed at professional investors. Whatever the market condition, financial news, says Ailes, is here to stay. It’s just that there may be far fewer people tuning in.
