Disney had a win this week — but future in traditional TV still in question

 Disney (DIS) resolved its high-profile dispute with cable giant Charter (CHTR) earlier this week — but the company's future in traditional TV remains unclear as multiple news outlets reported that Disney has engaged in early stage talks with both Nexstar Media Group (NXST) and businessman Byron Allen to sell its broadcast and cable channels.

The talks, first reported by Bloomberg, are said to still be in exploratory stages; however, Allen did reportedly offer $10 billion for the purchase of ABC, National Geographic, FX, and other Disney-owned local broadcast channels.

Nexstar declined to comment. Allen Media Group did not immediately respond to Yahoo Finance's request.

In a statement, Disney said, "While we are open to considering a variety of strategic options for our linear businesses, at this time The Walt Disney Company has made no decision with respect to the divestiture of ABC or any other property and any report to that effect is unfounded."

The reports come after Disney and Charter reached a precedent-setting agreement on Monday following a contract dispute that led Disney to pull its owned and operated channels, including ESPN and ABC, off Charter Spectrum cable systems in late August.

As part of the deal, Charter will offer some Disney streaming services — the ad-supported version of Disney+, ESPN+, and ESPN's yet-to-be-launched direct-to-consumer offering — for select cable packages at no additional cost to the consumer.

Linear TV 'past the point of no return'

Disney resolved its high-profile dispute with cable giant Charter earlier this week — but the company's linear future still remains unclear. (Igor Golovniov/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

The Charter dispute had raised questions about the future of the traditional cable TV bundle, especially as more consumers drop their cable packages in a trend known as cord-cutting and instead opt for streaming services that are less profitable for media companies.

According to recent data from Nielsen, linear TV viewership fell below 50% in July for the first time. Broadcast and cable each hit a new low of 20% and 29.6% of total TV usage, respectively, to combine for a linear television total of 49.6%.

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