Fox Business Network is “cost neutral,” says Ailes

TALKING BIZ NEWS EXCLUSIVE

Fox Business Network, which launched in October 2007, is now “cost neutral,” said Roger Ailes, the president of the Fox News Channel and chairman of the Fox Television stations group.

Ailes, 71, added that the network, which competes against CNBC, spends about $150 million for its programming compared to the $800 million spent for programming at Fox News.

“Business news is a small niche,” said Ailes, who ran CNBC for 2 1/2 years. “It’s not surprising that Fox Business is where it is.”

Ailes spoke Thursday evening at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He noted that he was due to receive a $3 million bonus if he could make Fox Business Network break even by June 2012. That occurred in June 2011, “so I could afford to come to see you today,” he quipped.

Fox Business Network is currently in 58 million to 60 million homes, said Ailes, compared to 90 million homes for CNBC.

The business news channel “is doing pretty well,” said Ailes.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.