In a move that Sirius XM was confident would happen, the FCC has made the decision not to extend the price freeze that had been in place over the last three years.  This paves the way for Sirius XM to now have total control over their pricing from the standpoint of the government.  There are still pending issues (such as the Blessing case and the Shenk lawsuit) that take the company’s pricing into question, but at this point the company is free to price their service at any level they feel makes business sense.

Sirius XM has not raised the base price of their service in many years.  Other aspects such as an increase in family plan pricing, Internet feed pricing, and the implementation of a royalty fee pass-through have made enjoying satellite radio more expensive however.

At this point Sirius XM has stated, as part of the Blessing proposed settlement, that they will freeze prices until the end of 2011.  That proposed settlement has come under fire with various objections that could throw wrinkles into when the company contemplates a price hike.

With Satellite Radio 2.0 set to launch this fall,  it will be interesting to see what Sirius XM does with their pricing structure.  If the company wanted to risk getting technical, they could potentially raise the rates on new subscribers which are not members of the class, but that endeavor is likely not worth the potential backlash.  In Q1 the company added only 120,000 self paying subscribers.  Getting a few extra bucks from a number this small may simply not be in the cards or worth the effort.

Position – Long Sirius XM Satellite Radio