Jan. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Comcast Corp., the largest U.S. cable operator, will write down the value of its stake in Clearwire Corp. in its fourth-quarter results, a person familiar with the situation said.

Comcast won’t record a charge on its franchise rights, the person said today. Time Warner Cable Inc., the No. 2 provider, said today it would write down $350 million on its Clearwire investment and take a $15 billion charge on its franchise rights, agreements with municipalities to provide cable services.

Comcast performed an annual review of its assets in July and doesn’t foresee any revisions or writedowns on the franchise rights, said the person, who declined to be identified because Comcast hasn’t made the plan public. Clearwire, which fell 64 percent in 2008, is building a network for mobile phones and laptops to challenge AT&T Inc. and Verizon Wireless.

Intel Corp., Bright House Networks and Google Inc. have also invested in Clearwire. Intel, the world’s largest chipmaker, said today it wrote down its stake by $950 million. Comcast invested $1.05 billion in the venture but hasn’t assessed how much the value has fallen, the person said.

Comcast spokesman John Demming declined to comment.

Time Warner Cable’s writedown of its franchise rights reflects a drop in parent company Time Warner Inc.’s stock price, slowing subscriber growth and a decline in revenue from pay-per-view services, premium channels and digital-video recording rentals.

Comcast fell 59 cents, or 3.4 percent, to $16.64 at 4 p.m. New York time in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The stock has dropped 2.1 percent in the past year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kelly Riddell in Washington at Kriddell1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: January 7, 2009 16:09 EST