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Paramount has officially launched a tender offer for current WBD shares at $30 per share, all cash. That bid is backed by $41 billion in equity financing. The remainder will be money from RedBird Capital and Jared Kushner’s Affinity Partners. Paramount also has $54 billion in debt commitments from Bank of America, Citi and Apollo Global Management. Paramount’s tender offer will be open for 20 business days, Paramount Chief Strategy Officer Andy Gordon said during a conference call for investors Monday. Warner Bros. Discovery has 10 days to respond, and after the 20 business days are up, Paramount has the...

Paramount boss David Ellison is believed to have assured Trump officials that if the government approves the company's acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery (WBD), he would overhaul the President's media arch-nemesis, CNN. Netflix announced last Friday that it reached a deal to acquire Warner and HBO properties for $72 billion, but Paramount immediately launched a hostile counterbid, taking its case directly to shareholders. The Netflix-WBD merger is facing a stiff challenge from Paramount, whose majority shareholder is billionaire Trump ally, Oracle founder Larry Ellison. On Monday, Paramount made its move, offering $77.9 billion in all-cash and urging Warner shareholders to...

The FCC is seeking the public’s input on Nexstar Media Group and Tegna’s pending $6.2 billion merger. On Monday, the agency began accepting the two companies’ applications to transfer the licenses of Tegna’s 64 full-power television stations, one AM radio station, one FM radio station and other related FCC licenses to Nexstar. Per a public notice released by the agency, Nexstar has said that it would serve 54.5% of the national audience post-transaction and is seeking a waiver of the National Television Multiple Ownership Rule, which prohibits a single entity from owning television stations that, in the aggregate, reach more...

President Donald Trump said Sunday that the proposed $72 billion merger between Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery "could be a problem" because of the amount of market share the resulting company would have. The value of the deal balloons to more than $82 billion when debt is accounted for. Netflix said Friday it would purchase Warner Bros. Discovery's film studio, HBO and the streaming service HBO Max. If the deal is approved, Netflix would also get access to decades of films and shows in the Warner Bros. Pictures archive. The deal would not include cable networks owned by Warner Bros....

What to know about the $82.7-billion Netflix-Warner Bros. deal that will reshape Hollywood Netflix and Warner Bros. announced early this morning a blockbuster $82.7-billion deal for the TV streamer to acquire Warner Bros. film and television studios, HBO Max and HBO. Here’s what we know so far. The takeover would give Netflix such beloved characters and franchises as Batman, Harry Potter and “Game of Thrones.” Netflix’s cash and stock transaction is valued at about $27.75 per Warner Bros. Discovery share. Netflix will take on another $10 billion in Warner Bros. debt. Warner’s cable channels, including CNN, TNT and HGTV, are...

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has approved Boeing’s long-planned acquisition of Spirit AeroSystems two decades after it was spun off, according to The Seattle Times. The decision was issued on Wednesday and allows the $4.7 billion all-stock merger to proceed under conditions designed to preserve competition in both the commercial and defense aviation sectors. In a July 2024 news release, Boeing emphasized that the transaction is intended to improve manufacturing consistency and support the company’s engineering workforce. Boeing’s total assumption of Spirit’s debt brings the transaction value to about $8.3 billion. In its complaint released earlier this month, the FTC...

NEW YORK (AP) — Skydance and Paramount officially closed their $8 billion merger on Thursday — kicking off the reign of a new entertainment giant after a contentious, over year-long endeavor to get the transaction over the finish line. The new company — which will trade under the “PSKY” ticker on Wall Street — brings Paramount’s legacy Hollywood footprint, major TV networks like CBS and MTV, streaming services and more under the roof of a new power player: billionaire Skydance founder David Ellison. “Today marks an exciting and pivotal moment as we prepare to bring Paramount’s legacy as a Hollywood...

Union Pacific wants to buy Norfolk Southern in a $85 billion deal that would create the first transcontinental railroad in the U.S, and potentially trigger a final wave of rail mergers across the country. The proposed merger, announced Tuesday, would marry Union Pacific’s vast rail network in the West with Norfolk’s rails that snake across the Eastern United States. The combined railroad would include more than 50,000 miles of track in 43 states with connections to major ports on both coasts. The nation was first linked by rail in 1869, when a golden railroad spike was driven in Utah to...

Stephen Colbert declared to Donald Trump that “the gloves are off” in his first broadcast since his Late Show was cancelled amid a political firestorm, as his fellow hosts lined up to defend him with Jon Stewart scathingly denouncing Paramount for trying to “censor and control” its hosts. Colbert, the top-rated late-night talk show host in the US, said last week on his CBS show Late Night – which he took over from David Letterman in 2015 – that Paramount’s decision to pay a $16m settlement to Trump over another flagship CBS show, 60 Minutes, amounted to a “big fat...

Protesters gathered in New York City to hold a “We’re With Colbert” rally on Sunday in support of the recently canned ” The Late Show” host. The rally was held outside of the CBS Broadcast Center on Manhattan‘s West Side, according to the New York Post. The outlet noted that only around 20 people showed up to the event, with most attendees — including the New York Police Department (NYPD) officers assigned to keep the peace — leaving shortly after it began. “Our country is not perfect, never has been,” the event organizer told the outlet. The event organizer went...

Jon Stewart does not sound like he is losing sleep over “The Daily Show” potentially being canceled if Skydance’s acquisition of Paramount is approved. Stewart, on the Thursday episode of his “The Weekly Show” podcast, was asked if he is concerned the deal would spell the end of the long-running comedy program, in part because of his recent criticism of Paramount and President Donald Trump. The 62-year-old comedian said he is not worried about it. “You know, unfortunately, we haven’t heard anything from [Paramount or Skydance]. They haven’t called me and said like, ‘Don’t get too comfortable in that office.’”...

President Donald Trump’s top consumer protection and antitrust official has approved a massive $13.5 billion merger that will reshape the advertising industry, effectively putting the final nail in the coffin of coordination against outlets based on their political viewpoints. The Federal Trade Commission announced Monday morning that it has decided not to block a merger between Omnicom and IPG, two rival firms which together make up a third of the world’s “Big Six” advertising agencies. But rather than rubber stamp the deal, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson extracted a major concession: the firms have agreed to cease all coordination related to...

U.S. Steel shares are jumping in premarket trading Friday on a report that Nippon Steel is offering to spend as much as $7 billion to upgrade the American company’s aging Rust Belt facilities in a bid to obtain the Trump administration's approval of their $14 billion merger. The Biden administration had blocked the sale of U.S. Steel to Japan’s Nippon Steel on national security grounds in January. Semafor reported that Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel are in talks with the Trump administration for the Japanese company to raise its $2.7 billion planned investment in the US firm's facilities. U.S. Steel...

he budding romance between Honda and Nissan may have already come to an end. On Thursday, Nissan president Makoto Uchida informed his counterpart, Honda president Toshihiro Mibe, that he was pulling out of merger talks, according to several media reports. A withdrawal ends months of behind-the-scenes conversations between the two Japanese carmakers. The two auto giants, along with fellow carmaker Mitsubishi Motors, announced in late December that they would explore a merger, possibly creating the world’s third-largest automaker. Honda, No. 57 on the most recent Fortune Global 500 ranking, reported $141.3 billion in revenue for 2023; Nissan, at No. 136,...

Albertsons said Wednesday that it has terminated a $25 billion merger agreement with Kroger and will sue the grocery giant, alleging the company didn’t do enough to get the deal done. Judges in Washington and Oregon on Tuesday blocked the deal, delivering a win to federal regulators and consumer advocates who argued the merger could harm competition, consumers and workers and push prices up. “Rather than fulfill its contractual obligations to ensure that the merger succeeded, Kroger acted in its own financial self-interest, repeatedly providing insufficient divestiture proposals that ignored regulators’ concerns. Kroger’s self-serving conduct, taken at the expense of...

A U.S. District Judge in Oregon has blocked a $25 billion-bid by supermarket giant Kroger to take over rival Albertsons after ruling that the Federal Trade Commission's concerns about the merger's impact on market consolidation were valid. Judge Adrienne Nelson said Tuesday afternoon that a merger between the two companies would end up harming consumers. The two companies "engage in substantial head-to-head competition and the proposed merger would remove that competition," Ferguson wrote. As a result, the proposed merger would likely to lead to outcomes that "unilaterally" harm consumers, and is thus "presumptively unlawful. " Judge Ferguson also ruled the...

U.S. Steel shares plunged on Wednesday as Wall Street questioned whether its $14.1 billion deal with Japan's Nippon Steel is at risk of derailing. Shares of U.S. Steel plunged as much as 25% in afternoon trading after the Washington Post reported President Joe Biden is preparing to formally block the proposed acquisition. As of 2:35 p.m., shares of U.S. Steel were down $7.12, or 20%, to $28.48. The White House downplayed the Washington Post report, which cited three people familiar with the president's plans. In a statement, it cited a process of review by the Committee on Foreign Investments in...

The liaison team of the Labor Party, led by Yair Golan, and the Meretz party, led by party secretary general Tomer Reznik, have reached a merger agreement to form a party called "The Democrats." Both parties have pointed out that this is not a "technical bloc," but rather a "historical process that has finally produced one large and united party, a liberal-democratic Zionist party that will be a political home to a large public in Israel; for those who are going out to defend the image and character of the country, as well as for civil entities that are striving...

Growing up in San Bernardino, California in the 1980s was an experience that shaped me in many ways. One of the highlights of those years was playing high school football, and one of our fiercest rivals was Fontana High School. Fontana was known for having one of the toughest football teams in San Bernardino County, and our games against them were always intense and hard-fought. But Fontana was more than just a football rival. It was a town with a long and proud history of steel production. The Kaiser steel production facility, a major employer in the area, closed its...

In October 2022, I shared a big announcement in the retail world: Two massive, U.S. grocery store chains, Kroger and Albertsons, had agreed to merge, in a deal worth nearly $25 billion:CNBC:Rival grocers Kroger and Albertsons on Friday announced plans to team up.The companies said Kroger agreed to buy Albertsons for $34.10 a share in a deal valued at $24.6 billion. Albertsons shares had closed Thursday at $28.63 after surging on reports that a deal was imminent.Kroger is the second-largest grocer by market share in the United States, behind Walmart, and Albertsons is fourth, after Costco. Together, Kroger and Albertsons...