Time Warner Cable Inc Chief Executive Glenn Britt said on Tuesday that the cable television operator is seeing a small increase in bad debt from subscribers in subprime housing areas.
Britt told investors at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia conference that there had been a "little uptick" in consumers who cannot pay their cable television bill in markets populated with homes bought with subprime loans.
"Everyone is trying to figure out what will be the impact of the subprime situation and so-called credit crunch," said the CEO of the No 2 US cable service operator. He added that cable "has done well historically during recession."
Cable stocks have traditionally been viewed as a defensive play during an economic downturn as consumers were unlikely to cut their cable TV bill even as they reduce spending elsewhere. But some Wall Street analysts have questioned whether that has changed, now that cable bills are significantly higher due to so-called triple play packages that combine video with Internet and phone services.