The CRTC has approved the addition of non-Canadian services MSNBC and Bloomberg Television to the lists of eligible satellite services for digital distribution.

The MSNBC request was made by cable operators Shaw Communications and Rogers Cable. Rogers and Shaw have been operating MSNBC Canada in partnership with MSNBC since 2001, but the two cable operators told the CRTC that a 24-hour breaking news format adhering to Canadian programming requirements was too financially burdensome and they would be surrendering the licence whether application for the U.S. service was granted or not.

Shaw alone made the request to add U.S. business and financial channel Bloomberg Television to the digital services lists. This channel replaces Bloomberg Canada for which Shaw received a Category 2 specialty TV licence in 2000 but never launched.

ROBTv airs two hours of Bloomberg programming each morning and Bloomberg will continue to offer this service to the Bell Globemedia-owned business news channel.

In granting these requests, it is the view of the CRTC that ‘neither MSNBC nor Bloomberg is partially or totally competitive with any Canadian pay or specialty services.’