Arturo (Arte) R. Moreno filed an updated Schedule 13 last week with the Securities and Exchange Commission confirming that he had recently purchased 6,031,482 shares of Common Stock of Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings, Inc. in open market transactions for an aggregate purchase price of $5,914,552.60, including brokerage commissions. Funding of the purchases of the Common Stock was from Mr. Moreno’s personal funds. In total Mr. Moreno now personally owns over 63 million common shares of Clear Channel which is 12.8% of the common shares.
Insider articles indicate that Moreno starting buying Clear Channel shares in earnest in the second half of 2023. He also, at that time, was discussing selling the Los Angeles Angels, which he ended up not moving forward on. Forbes Magazine was quoted, at the time that, “a source familiar with the group’s thinking says they believe Clear Channel’s stock – which is down more than 50% the last 18 months – is undervalued, and that its earnings multiple is only trailing industry peers, like Lamar Advertising Company and Outfront Media, due to the company’s large debt pile.”
SignValue Take: Based on the latest updates from Clear Channel, they still have a lot of work to do to get the Company on positive footing. However, we believe it is possible to turn things around in a matter of five years. First, the company needs to convince its lenders to let them spend some of their foreign sale proceeds on a few strategic US acquisitions. Second, there needs to be new leadership with a heavy focus on traditional billboard sign (pronounced “real estate”) development. Coupled with some other systemic changes, higher returns on new development and higher cash flow margins could lead to a turnaround in the stock price and meaningful reduction in debt.
As to the lagging stock value, here is a graph of the stock price over the last 5 years.
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