The retail investor has not come back

There is ample evidence that the retail investor has not come back to the market. These stats are consistent with this evidence. They may also be indicative of the fact that people are tiring of “tout” TV. My impression, based on sporadic viewing, is that this message has been absorbed. The on-air tone seems to have gone from ultra-optimistic to merely optimistic. References to GE below indicate they have made another enemy.

CNBC September Total Viewership Down 37% YoY

According to Nielsen, CNBC’s annual decline in total September viewership was a massive 37%: the worst YoY performance in 2009. The decline in the demo audience also hit a high of 27%. The dilemma for Jeff Immelt is the following: do CNBC pundits keep pumping GE (which everyone ignores, as CNBC’s credibility is practically nonexistent), or, at the expense of marking a few hundred billion assets at GECC to fair market value, incite another major market crisis. Perhaps, just perhaps, if the later were to occur, CNBC would have some chance of salvaging its prior year numbers. Although with CNBC now spending hours a day advertising GE engines, it seems like external advertisers couldn’t care less: after all, GE is subsidizing its own station by selling them ad space. Business schools have a word for that: vertical integration. Sane people have another word: biased reporting.