By WYATTE GRANTHAM-PHILIPS, AP Business Writer<\/p>\n
NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Paramount on Friday agreed to delay closing its $81 billion buyout of Warner Bros. Discovery well into next year, as a judge continues to consider a challenge from 12 states seeking to block the deal altogether.<\/p>\n
In a court filing, Paramount said it wouldn\u2019t close the merger until either a court ruling is made on the merits of the states\u2019 lawsuit or June 1, 2027. The move arrives just days after U.S. District Judge Araceli Mart\u00ednez-Olgu\u00edn granted a temporary restraining order to freeze the transaction for several weeks, ruling that the states had raised some \u201cserious questions\u201d and a strong case about the merger\u2019s potential to \u201csubstantially lessen competition.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paramount called Friday\u2019s agreement a \u201csignificant win because the result is exactly what we have sought from the outset: a direct path to a trial based on the evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n
The company, which was bought by Skydance just last year, added that this was the \u201cfastest and clearest way\u201d to prove its merger was good for competition and the wider industry.<\/p>\n
Twelve states, led by California, sued to block Paramount\u2019s pending buyout of Warner last month \u2014 alleging that such a combination would instead \u201cextinguish competition\u201d in Hollywood and lead to fewer choices for consumers, particularly moviegoers and cable customers.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the workers and artists who bring stories to life to the families who buy tickets at the box office, Paramount\u2019s illegal takeover of Warner Bros. is a bad deal for all those who count on a competitive entertainment industry,\u201d New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is among those suing to block the merger, said Friday.<\/p>\n
She called the agreement to halt the deal a \u201ccritical victory.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By WYATTE GRANTHAM-PHILIPS, AP Business Writer NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Paramount on Friday agreed to delay closing its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":411237,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[48,52,51,47,50,49,6336,14955],"class_list":["post-411236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-paramount","tag-warner-bros"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411236"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411236\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/411237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}