{"id":657418,"date":"2026-05-09T04:05:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T04:05:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/657418\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T04:05:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T04:05:09","slug":"opposition-mounts-to-paramount-wbd-merger-will-it-make-a-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/657418\/","title":{"rendered":"Opposition Mounts to Paramount-WBD Merger. Will It Make a Difference?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThere\u2019s a lot of sound and fury against David Ellison\u2019s pending $111 billion megamerger with Warner Bros. Discovery<\/a>. But what changes to the current terms of the pact will it signify \u2014 if any?<\/p>\n

\n\tMark Ruffalo claimed<\/a> in a New York Times op-ed this week Hollywood stars are afraid of signing a letter against the deal<\/a> (which now has nearly 5,000 signatories<\/a>) out of fear of being blacklisted. House Democrats are urging<\/a> California Attorney General Rob Bonta to \u201cclosely scrutinize\u201d the deal. <\/p>\n

\n\tDeal opponents continue to bang the drum about why the Paramount-Warner Bros. consolidation is bad: fewer jobs and less consumer choice. They point to the fact that even though Trump\u2019s Justice Department settled its antitrust case against Ticketmaster and Live Nation, a coalition of state AGs won a jury verdict against the companies<\/a>. There\u2019s also the multi-state litigation against Nexstar-Tegna, which has stymied the integration of the two local TV station groups as the court reviews the claims that the tie-up is anticompetitive. \u201cWe believe this is a fight worth having \u2014 for us, for the industry, and for the future of local journalism,\u201d Nexstar chief Perry Sook told investors<\/a> this week.<\/p>\n

\n\tFCC Commissioner Anna Gomez, who\u2019s the only Democratic commissioner at the agency, this week called for the FCC to conduct a \u201cvigorous\u201d review<\/a> of the foreign investment in the proposed Paramount-WBD pact. That came after Paramount disclosed that the merged entity will be\u00a049.5% owned by foreign investors<\/a>, with about 38.5% of the equity in the new company owned by the three Middle Eastern funds. Paramount\u2019s WBD deal has a $24 billion commitment from the\u00a0sovereign wealth funds of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Abu Dhabi<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe American public deserves to know who owns the airwaves that carry their news,\u201d Gomez said. \u201cI am alarmed by what appears to be an effort to rubber stamp a financial structure that places nearly half of one of America\u2019s largest broadcast and media companies into the hands of foreign governments with documented records of press suppression and a troubling willingness to silence journalists.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tParamount owns CBS, which holds broadcast licenses regulated by the FCC. Gomez noted that under federal law, foreign governments and their representatives are prohibited from owning those licenses, and any indirect foreign ownership above 25% requires FCC approval. There\u2019s no signal yet that the FCC plans to conduct such a review under Trump-appointed chairman Brendan Carr.<\/p>\n

\n\tEllison is sticking with one of his favorite talking points about why Paramount-WBD is good for Hollywood: He says the combined entity will release at least 30 films annually<\/a>. He notes that Paramount alone has nearly doubled its film slate from eight titles in 2025 to 15 this year. <\/p>\n

\n\tMore films in theaters, however, doesn\u2019t necessarily mean more money. Paramount, in reporting Q1 earnings, reiterated<\/a> that it expects \u201csignificantly lower theatrical revenue year-over-year due to lower average box office revenue per film across more releases\u201d in 2026. Yes, that it\u2019s facing a tough year-over-year comparison because of 2025\u2019s \u201cMission: Impossible \u2013 The Final Reckoning\u201d (which banked nearly $600 million at the global box office). But it shows that simply churning out more titles doesn\u2019t actually correlate with bigger economic impact. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe legal question for those hoping to block Paramount-WBD is whether it\u2019s inherently anticompetitive. A lawsuit filed on behalf of three Paramount+ subscribers<\/a> on antitrust grounds last week alleges the merged company would become the biggest of the Hollywood studios, topping Disney. But the lawsuit estimates a merged Paramount-WBD studio would have approximately 23.6% market share \u2014 nothing close to monopoly territory.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd according to Nielsen data for February, WBD and Paramount \u2014 streaming and TV all-in \u2014 would have 12.2% share of total U.S. TV watch time. So it would seem to be tough to make an antitrust argument.<\/p>\n

\n\tAt this point, those agitating against the merger might see their most realistic option being to lobby for conditions on the merger, such as job-protection guarantees or production minimums. <\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav is biding his time as he awaits the deal close, which the parties still expect to happen in September. In 2025, he received a nearly $110 million<\/a> stock-option grant for leading the plan to split WBD into two entities. Of course, that won\u2019t happen if Paramount\u2019s proposed acquisition is consummated, but Zaslav gets to keep the options in any event. Read our analysis of media CEOs\u2019 rich compensation packages from this week\u2019s issue of Variety.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a lot of sound and fury against David Ellison\u2019s pending $111 billion megamerger with Warner Bros. Discovery.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":657419,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[49,48,75,27395,348,8093],"class_list":["post-657418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-paramount-skydance","tag-tv","tag-warner-bros-discovery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/657419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}