Warner Bros. Discovery CEO’s bidding war destroyed – Business News
David Zaslav simply pulled off one of the biggest media mergers of the century — however that doesn’t imply he’s completed wheeling and dealing.
The wily CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery has bought the media giant for $72 billion — more than doubling its worth in a matter of months. He might get even more, relying on whom you speak to, capping one of the more momentous govt comeback tales lately.
Before we get into why the cake isn’t fairly baked on WBD’s future, let’s take into account what simply went down with Zaslav’s mosh-pit-style bidding war, how he set some of the most important media moguls towards one another, ramping up the sale price of his company to ranges no one thought doable.
When all this started in September, WBD’s stock was within the toilet, trading at round $12 a share, simply above its one-year low of $7.50. That’s when Paramount Skydance noticed worth the place no one did, besides perhaps Zaslav; they provided $23.50 — or round $56 billion — for all of WBD, its studio, the HBO Max streaming service, in addition to cable channels CNN, HBO and Discovery.
It was regarded as a completed deal. Paramount Skydance’s deep-pocketed homeowners, David and Larry Ellison, promised WBD shareholders all money for an asset that was teetering, and a regulatory glide path by the Trump administration given the elder Ellison’s close friendship with President Trump.
Not fairly. Zaslav is a protégé of two of the best CEOs in current historical past, Jack Welch and cable pioneer John Malone. That put him in line to grow to be CEO of newly created Warner Bros. Discovery, a deal engineered by Malone, fashioned after the AT&T spinoff of Warner Media in 2022.
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Money-losing belongings
Warner’s belongings included a main studio that misplaced money, an unprofitable streaming service, and outdated media cable channels like HBO, CNN, TNT and the Food Network. Zaslav was saddled with billions in debt. He took heat cratering shareholder worth whereas paying himself hundreds of thousands.
Larry Ellison, chairman and chief technology officer of Oracle Corporation, sits within the Oval Office of the White House as President Donald Trump indicators an govt order, Monday, Feb. 3, 2025, in Washington. AP
What the market and media naysayers didn’t recognize is that he was scaling down a bloated operation and enhancing the Warner studio — it grew to become the primary to surpass $4 billion in revenues in 2025. He was additionally building up his streaming service, lastly selecting a identify, HBO Max, which is now the industry’s third largest.
To his credit, David Ellison noticed that potential early on — at the same time as he was within the throes of making an attempt to buy Paramount from the initially reluctant Redstone household, after which maneuvering by the odd maze of the Trump administration’s regulatory equipment.
He noticed that he may mix CBS with CNN, bail out Paramount’s feeble streaming community with HBO Max, and complement Paramount’s studio with Warner’s, gaining tons of mental property with some of essentially the most iconic programming in current historical past, equivalent to “The Sopranos,” “Harry Potter” and “Game of Thrones.”
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Nearly the second David and Larry swooped in with an initial offer for all of WBD three months in the past, the bigger bidding war was on. As the Post first reported, Zas started pitching a sale of some or all of the company to Amazon, Apple and others. In the tip, he settled on a bidding contest amongst Comcast, Paramount Skydance and Netflix. Zas, as he’s recognized in media and Wall Street circles, set his price goal at $30 a share and deal members scoffed: Who would pay $30 a share for one thing that traded at round $7 simply a few months in the past?
Misplaced confidence
The Ellisons appeared notably assured they might underbid for the reason that Trump administration, as we reported, wished WBD within the Ellisons’ palms. Trump and Larry Ellison are buddies, Larry being a long time MAGA supporter. Plus the deal appeared the cleanest of all of the bidders with out a lot overlap to current antitrust worries.
Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison speaks during the Bloomberg Screentime convention in Los Angeles on October 9, 2025. AFP through Getty Images
Trump was additionally mentioned to love the thought of the Ellisons controlling CNN, which he considers anti-MAGA. DOJ Antitrust despatched out phrase it didn’t like all these streaming prospects — Netflix’s 300 million plus one other 100 million of HBO Max — in a single company.
But the bids saved growing. Netflix’s Ted Sarandos was bought on Zaslav’s pitch to complement his streaming empire with a top-flight studio that may produce namebrand, home-grown content material. Now lusting for a deal, Sarandos met with Trump and developed a friendship he and Zaslav imagine will mollify the regulatory hurdles. Comcast saved bidding up in addition to its chief, Brian Roberts — regardless of his fraught relationship with Trump for proudly owning the MAGA-hating MS NOW — tried to clean issues over with massive presents to construct the new White House ballroom.
The Ellisons just lately got here in at $30 a share; Netflix sealed the deal at $30.75.
The Ellisons hate dropping and are planning a counterattack; they may bid even more or go hostile, arguing their all-cash offer is greater than Netfix’s money and stock even when its complete price beats theirs by 75 cents.
How’s that for creating shareholder worth?
