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Radio Giant Audacy Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

Audacy, one of the largest radio networks in the nation, filed for bankruptcy on Sunday to restructure its billion-dollar debt load.

Photo of Audacy radio mobile app
Photo via Connor Lin / The Daily Upside

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In 1927, Hollywood introduced talkies, leading to the first known prediction of radio’s demise. They’ve been writing obituaries for the medium pretty much ever since. 

Prepare to read more. Audacy, one of the largest radio networks in the nation, filed for bankruptcy on Sunday to restructure its billion-dollar debt load.

Signal and Noise

The Philadelphia-based network — which counts New York’s 1010 WINS and Chicago’s 780 WBBM among its stations, with ventures into podcasting — may have been a little over-ambitious in the twilight of the analog age. In 2017, the company dropped $1.7 billion to acquire CBS Radio, effectively tripling the size of its business. But growth comes at a cost in an industry that otherwise isn’t growing. Call it the end-of-life cycle for legacy media: Younger audiences tune out, advertising revenue shrinks, and debt starts to bloat.

With its bankruptcy filing, Audacy hopes to finally see daylight again:

  • In the federal bankruptcy court petition filed in the Southern District of Texas, the radio giant listed total debt of $2.66 billion and assets of $2.79 billion. 
  • With a restructuring pact approved by a “supermajority” of creditors, Audacy will hand over some ownership stake to creditors in exchange for wiping out over $1.6 billion of debt, the company announced. Meanwhile, its outstanding bonds and loans will be slashed from $1.9 billion to just $350 million.

iHeart to Heart: If the story of a radio conglomerate declaring bankruptcy sounds familiar, that’s because it should. Back in 2018, iHeart Media, the largest radio industry conglomerate by revenue, declared bankruptcy and underwent a similar restructuring deal.

First Time Podder: Audacy, like iHeart and other radio players, has attempted to bridge the gap to audio’s future by investing in podcasting. The only problem? It still doesn’t make up the revenue shortfall from the heyday of radio. Overall podcast industry revenue came in at just under $1.4 billion in 2023, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers. Major radio broadcasters, meanwhile, saw revenue of around $10.2 billion last year, down from almost $14 billion in 2017, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. Podcasting, it seems, may not be a foolproof escape pod after all.