Cable stocks took it on the chin on Monday (June 13), as the S&P 500 fell into bear-market territory after investors opted to minimize risk as fears of the possibility of higher interest rates and other money-tightening measures came closer to reality.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 — which includes cable stocks like Charter Communications, Comcast, The Walt Disney Co., Fox Corp. and Paramount Global — dipped 3.9% on June 13, as inflationary fears spooked the markets. Investors appeared worried the Federal Reserve could raise interest rates in a move to slow down the economy after federal data showed consumer prices rose 8.6% year-over-year in May, its quickest increase since 1981.

The decline in the S&P 500 coincided with an 875-point (2.8%) drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and a 4.7% decline in the NASDAQ Index. The S&P’s Monday falloff brought the benchmark squarely in the bear market realm — down more than 20% since its January high — the first bear market in the U.S. since 2020, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Stocks across the board were hammered, but tech shares were hit particularly hard, with Alphabet, Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook), Apple and Amazon all falling between 4% and 6% for the day.

Netflix, which has been battling declines after it reported its first ever quarterly subscriber loss in Q1, saw its shares dip by 7.2% to $169.69 each. So far this year, Netflix has shed more than 70% of its value — the stock was priced at $602.44 per share on Dec. 31.

Among the biggest losers in the cable programming sector for the day were Paramount Global (down 8.1%), Warner Bros. Discovery (down 5.6%), and Disney. (down 3.7%). Distributors also were hit hard. Altice USA fell 7.5% to $9.25 per share, while Charter fell 4.2%. Cable One dipped 4.1% and Comcast slipped 3.4% for the day.

Streaming companies like Roku (-11.4%), fuboTV (-9.1%) and others were hit hard as well. Roku, a traditionally volatile stock in its own right, had been slipping in the past few days after a nearly 10% boost on June 8 as rumors swirled that Netflix was planning a takeover of the company. Those gains have been erased.

Telcos AT&T (down 4.5%), Verizon Communications (down 2.4%) and T-Mobile US (down 4.5%) fared better than satellite-TV service provider (and wireless newcomer) Dish Network, which fell 8.9%. Dish is in the middle of finishing out the first phase of its wireless buildout — the network needs to reach 20% of its footprint by the end of June — and launched service in Las Vegas earlier last month. ■  

Charter Communications won’t fill the spot on the S&P 500 Index left by its merger partners Time Warner Cable once its deal is completed, a move that according to one analyst could put some short-term pressure on the stock.

JP Morgan media analyst Phil Cusick said S&P’s decision to replace TWC with Digital Realty Trust on the Index could force more shareholders to sell their stock.

In a note to clients, Cusick said that instead of the 10 million shares previously expected to be sold by indexers he expects 32 million shares to be sold by May 17, the expected closing date of the Charter-TWC deal.

In a note to clients Cusick said that could rpresent a buying opportunity for long-term investors in the stock.

“While this does not change our long-term thesis or price target on Charter, it is likely to create significant disruption this week going into the close Friday and removes what we had expected to be a significant driver of near-term performance in Charter shares,” Cusick wrote. “We would recommend fundamental holders buy Charter on weakness as the stock remains our top pick."