Net Neutrality: Policy and Stock Market Implications

From 2011 to 2015 the Telecommunications Industry faced changing FCC regulations that impacted daily business operations and stock price changes due to Net Neutrality. These changing regulations stemmed from rapidly morphing technology. The three types of firms in this study are Internet Service Providers (ISP\u27s) Content Providers (CP\u27s) who provide video streaming services and those who do not (ISP\u27s CP\u27s streaming and CP\u27s not streaming). During this era the FCC went through two different regulation regimes of the Preserving the Open Internet order and the Open Internet: Bright Line Rules with two key court hearings in between. These key events were analyzed based off how the announcement of the news impacted stock prices for the thirty-nine firms in the study. The Preserving the Open Internet order impacted the firms across our study with the most relevance. Date 1 resulted in a 0.836% excess returns for the stock prices while all other variables were held constant for our firms. Date 2 resulted in a 1.6% excess returns for the stock price while all other variables were held constant for our firms. Date 3 did not result in any significant results for our firms daily. Date 4 while impacting the firms at different sample levels did not result in any significant results for our firms daily at an entire sample level. With consumer preferences changing and firms changing business operations regularly it is important to understand how policies whether economically efficient or not impact the stock market

Assessing the Current State of Net Neutrality and Exploring Solutions in Creating and Maintaining Open, Available, and Innovative Internet and Broadband Services

This article examines the current state of net neutrality regulation in the United States. Debates surrounding net neutrality are varied and layered. They include legal questions regarding how the internet should be classified under existing statutes, and the level of authority for federal agencies when regulating internet service providers. The Article will provide an extensive background of net neutrality in the United States, discussing the pertinent case law and legislation that shaped the modern Internet regulatory landscape. It will conclude by discussing the current state of the law, focusing on the perspectives of proponents and opponents of the law as it currently stands under the Restoring Internet Freedom Order. Finally, it will analyze examples of measures that opponents of the Restoring Internet Freedom Order are taking to repeal it

How Might the Supreme Court, If It Reviews the Federal Communication\u27s 2015 Open Internet Order, Utilize the Chevron and Arbitrary and Capricious Tests?

The article focuses on two Supreme Court decisions, King v. Burwell and FCC v. Fox Televisions Stations, Inc., that provide diametrically different models for how deferential a court should be when it reviews administrative action. The former case addresses how deferential a court should be for an agency’s statutory interpretation of an ambiguous statute for a question that has significant economic and political effects but Congress had not expressly delegated the question to the agency. The latter case addresses how deferential a court should be when an agency’s changes a policy that is within its statutory authority. These two cases are briefly explained and then applied to the specific circumstances of the Federal Communications Commission’s 2015 Open Internet Order and the 2016 D.C. Circuit’s review of the action. This administrative action involved a reclassification of broadband service and generated substantial public comment and political posturing. If the Supreme Court decides to hear an appeal of the D.C. Circuit’s upholding of the agency action, then there is now a realistic possibility that the Court ignores the agency’s statutory interpretation in its entirety and reserves for itself resolution of the question. However, if the Court grants Chevron deference to the agency, there is a strong probability that it will find the agency’s change in policy a reasonable policy choice

Significance of Net Neutrality on Education and Health Care

The repeal of net neutrality regulation in the U.S. could result in the suppression of important information on the internet and reduce competition while the continuance of net neutrality could develop a digital divide among internet users. Net neutrality regulations aim to promote a free internet where internet service providers (ISP) are not allowed to influence content from content service providers (CSP) for their own financial interests. However, these regulations would cost the ISPs and consumers more money, since ISPs could no longer prioritize certain content, consequently increasing their cost of maintenance to handle the increase in traffic. Populations in rural areas, people of color, and low-income families could no longer have access to the internet as a result of the increase in internet prices and costs from the ISPs. There are still some positives that come from net neutrality, such as improved competition among CSPs and no financially driven decisions to suppress information. With ISPs regulated, CSPs can not pay more to have their data exposed over others. This will help create exposure and access to information from different CSPs, such as academic journals, resources, and other forms of media. In terms of education, especially in the medical field where large pharmaceutical companies can pay more to promote their research over other unethically, people will have a less polarized and less ISP-influenced experience on the internet

Net Neutrality: Something Old; Something New

Article published in the Michigan State Law Review