The FCC this week announced the filing of two applications seeking broadcast acquisitions by non-US based companies. In one available here, a company controlled by Mexican citizens would go from 25% to 100% ownership and control of a company that owns 2 FM stations in California and Arizona. In another, available here, an Italian company would acquire a number of radio stations in Florida. Each of the FCC notices ask for public comment on the proposed acquisitions.

As we wrote here, early this year, the FCC allowed an Australian couple to acquire a number of US broadcast properties, and (as we wrote here, here and here) the FCC has otherwise liberalized its rules to permit up to 100% foreign ownership of US stations where there would be no security risk to US interests from the purchase of the stations by foreign individuals or companies. This is a dramatic reversal of past precedent restricting “alien” ownership of US broadcast stations, and we have expected more foreign companies to make US investments in broadcast companies. Perhaps these two cases signal a start of a new wave of investment into the US broadcast market.