< The 2014 All-America Research Team

Total Appearances: 6

Analyst Debut: 2009Last year, Morgan Stanley’s Benjamin Swinburne advanced in Cable & Satellite from second place to first, where he remains, and now he does likewise on this roster. The 39-year-old researcher — dubbed “Big Picture Ben” by one admirer — tracks 28 names across both sectors. He is upbeat on the prospects for U.S. media players, whose shares leaped 21.5 percent over the 12 months through mid-September, besting the nation’s broad market by 4 percentage points. “The proliferation of content buyers globally” underpins his optimism, says Swinburne. “This includes extracting a greater economic share of consumer spending in the more mature U.S. market, and riding the growth in pay-TV and online media consumption internationally.” Moreover, he adds, “the pickup in M&A activity is shining a light on the value of content assets, as technology further fragments audience levels and brings more distribution competition into the marketplace. The largest headwind right now is the disappointing macro environment, which has manifested itself in disappointing advertising trends.” Swinburne earned a B.A. in public policy at Virginia’s Washington and Lee University and an M.S. in accounting from Babson College in Massachusetts. Before jumping to Morgan Stanley in 1999, he worked for two years as an M&A analyst and an auditor at telecommunications equipment provider Lucent Technologies in New Jersey. “He is one of the few analysts who can actually explain the high-level tectonics that are moving the media world,” remarks another loyalist.