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Comcast CEO Roberts: Cord-cutting is 'happening'

Comcast CEO Roberts talk about cord cutting and why consumers don't seem to like cable companies.

Comcast Corp. CEO Brian Roberts spoke at a conference in December 2015.
Comcast Corp. CEO Brian Roberts spoke at a conference in December 2015.Read moreAP Photo/Mark Lennihan

Comcast Corp. CEO Brian Roberts says in an interview that will air on Bloomberg TV tonight that that cord-cutting — or the shift by consumers to the internet and away from cable-TV — is "happening. We have seen it coming."

Roberts doesn't talk at length about cord-cutting, but it's an unusually direct admission of the trend by the Comcast boss.

Roberts made the comments in a 24-minute interview on Bloomberg TV's The David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations, hosted by Rubenstein, co-founder of the hedge-fund firm the Carlyle Group. The interview, which dealt more with Roberts' late father, Ralph, and the founding of the company, can be previewed here. It also can be watched on Bloomberg TV at 9 p.m. tonight.

Among other topics, Roberts says one of the reasons that consumers don't like cable companies is that "television used to be free and now most Americans are paying a lot of money for it and every year it can get more expensive."

Roberts told Rubenstein that he doesn't watch all of NBCUniversal's shows and movies before they come out. As to whether he tells NBCUniversal execs whether he likes or dislikes the shows, "I try to have discipline."

Rubenstein noted that Roberts, 57, was still relatively young and could stay at the helm of the company for two more decades. "You have to keep the company fresh. So we'll take this one day at a time," Roberts responded.