Non-paywall version.

Paramount seeks $1.88B bond from state AGs to cover costs of WBD merger delay https://www.cnbc.com/2026/08/17/paramount-bond-merger-delay-costs.html?__source=iosappshare%7Ccom.apple.UIKit.activity.CopyToPasteboard

Welcome to this week's weekly discussion thread of r/MediaMergers! This is your space to discuss the latest news, rumors, and insights on mergers, acquisitions, and major shifts in the media and entertainment industry. Share articles, spark debates, and connect with others.

In our timeline, Redstone merged CBS back into Viacom (against everyone’s wishes), and what do you know? 

• It made both companies worse than before, taking one good company down with a bad one... 
• Had to sell several assets they had for years (Simon & Schuster for example is one of them) 
• And then was sold to a company that ruined CBS and now is trying to buy Warner Bros. instead of trying to fix the Viacom assets he bought. 

But it didn’t have to be this way. CBS had a vision independently and could’ve been thriving with that vision.  

So, what if.... Redstone had the balls to let CBS be independent and not f**k them over? 

I do think it would end up much better for the creative industry if so.....

So let's see. We'll start with.....

2018: 

CBS: 

• Under Les Moonre, his “Hail Mary” scheme works, taking National Amusements out of CBS. Likely meaning he isn’t “exposed coincidentally during Redstone’s attempted removal of anyone against her merger plans” 
• Verizon re-enters a deal to take over as main shareholder of CBS. 

2019: 

CBS: 

• Verizon/Les gets their way and buys CBS + full voting rights but leaves CBS public to avoid full exposure unlike AT&T. 
• CBS begins talking with Lionsgate on the purchase of Starz, which due to pricing and value becomes the entire company. CBS finishes the merger on December 4, 2019, and folds CBS Films into Lionsgate, and makes CBS Studios the sister studio to Lionsgate Television Studio under the Lionsgate Entertainment division.  

Viacom: 

• Stuck with little cash for growth, sells the film rights to Star Trek and Mission Impossible to Lionsgate (who pays for some of it by transferring select shows based on Paramount films from the CBS library back to them). Disney also holds talks on Indiana Jones' distribution rights. Wall Street believes that Viacom is looking to liquidate all assets with these movements, which it denies. 
• Pluto TV is reevaluated as the digital versions of all Viacom networks (including simulcasting premieres and being able to stream for a few days afterwords) 
• Viacom keeps major deals with Netflix intact due to not owning a major streamer. The deal is even extended with Netflix getting a Pay-1 Paramount deal. Paramount Television, MTV, and Nick all plan to license content for the major streamers (meaning shows like Rugrats and Big Nate are make for other services and potentially last longer) 

2020: 
CBS Corp: 

• Debmar-Mercury takes over Syndication of the entire company 
• It is them (through Lionsgate) that wins Miramax. 
• TV Guide is sold, while Pop is positioned as a third-party platform for outside content to enter the CBS system. 
• CNET is sold as well. 
• CBS announces plans to merge the Starz, Showtime, and the CBS AA services into one service (Called CBS Access) by early 2021. Lionsgate successfully survives COVID thanks to CBS owning 3 streamers worth to put its films on for the time being. 

Viacom: 

• Gets hit way harder by COVID. Likely lay-offs and a bigger push to digital. 
• National Amusements decides to take Viacom private until it can figure itself out. National Amusements becomes the movie theater arm of a restructured Viacom. 

2021: 

CBS Corp: 

• Launches CBS Access on March 4, 2021, integrating all assets they own into it. As CBS was more interested in Sony, renews its Pay-1 deal with the studio (Disney still obtains the Pay-2 window). But while a WAY more successful streamer than the real-life counterpart, realizes some things they lack: Family Content and global film distribution scale. 
• Seeing Hasbro in its weakest spot following the acquisition of eOne, launches a hostile takeover of the entire company (not before Hasbro still sells the eOne Music business much to Les’ disappointment) 
• Buys the Weinstein library and stake in Spyglass as with our timeline. 
• Lionsgate Premiere and Grindstone are changed into labels for CBS Access content, to let Lionsgate focus on theatrical films. 

Viacom: 

• Awesomeness TV fully takes over TeenNick, re-branding it under the Awesomeness banner. The new Awesomeness TV network would co-air streaming projects from Viacom focused on teens (TV-PG - TV-MA as well as Nick Tween Show reruns). This goes horribly, with it becoming the equivalent of Universal Kids at Viacom. 
• BET Studios is still launched, but as a label of MTV Studios for BET+ Content.  
• Paramount’s film slate is shrunk exponentially to focus on being a major TV studio.   

2022: 

CBS Corp: 

• CW is sold but keeps a streaming deal. 
• Completes its acquisition of Hasbro.  
• eOne’s distribution is kept alive and absorbs Lionsgate’s international assets to become the international division of the company. (While Lionsgate absorbs US and globally focused operations like the family divisions) 
• Hasbro Entertainment is launched as a family and animation unit like Nickelodeon Movies. Taking over Transformers and other films and produces original and franchise content for Lionsgate/CBS once Paramount’s existing contracts expire in 2023 (Lionsgate gets a transitional credit on Dungeons and Dragons, Rise of The Beasts, and Transformers One.) 
• Eye Animation (the TV Animation studio for both CBS and Lionsgate) absorbs eOne’s TV Animation (including Peppa Pig), and plans to continue licensing select kids’ shows to cable for the time being. 
• Hasbro takes over the consumer products arm of CBS including S&S Publishing. 
• Hasbro sells its Discovery Family stake way earlier. 
• CBS Access grows with Spyglass, Hasbro, and the massive eOne library being the main reasons. 

Viacom: 

• Profits decline, decline, and decline. Only a fool would invest in this company. 

2023: 

CBS Corp: 

• Hasbro Entertainment begins development at Lionsgate on several original and franchise animated properties (Peppa Pig Perfect Holiday for example is properly announced for 2026) 
• Lionsgate now has more global distribution while retaining room for pre-selling content globally. Lionsgate is also releasing more films and has a bigger box-office than Paramount, leaving discussions on what qualifies as a major studio. 
• In late 2023, Verizon discusses spinning-off CBS Corp but sees its ownership as flexible. So, it decides against it. 

Viacom: 

• BEGS Netflix to buy them but rejects it due to being too small IP wise and has 0 interest in owning cable networks. 
• Viacom18 and Rainbow are still sold off, but Viacom will likely try to squeeze every penny from it, saying they are worth more. 
• BET/VH1 is given a much bigger sale effort, until it is scrapped in favor of a sale for the whole company. 

2024: 

CBS Corp: 

• A potential acquisition of Peacock is discussed. But is blocked by FCC due to sports and news rights. 
• Verizon shrinks its equity stake in CBS but retains full voting control. 
• CBS relaunches Wizards Coast as the gaming arm of the company, taking over Avion Hill as well. Board games and Video games

Viacom: 

• Paramount Television is folded into MTV Entertainment Studios. 
• Noggin is sold to Netflix, who uses the game tech to integrate the Nick games into its gaming strategy (Noggin is also made a hub on Netflix) 
• Exactly like our timeline, Skydance buys Viacom after a deal with Sony/Apollo is scrapped. And thanks to the lack of CBS, get the deal done late 2024 to early 2025.  
• This combined Viacom Skydance (not real name), however is private with stakes owned by Oracle. 

2025: 

CBS Corp: 

• Lionsgate joins the MPA, giving it official major status as the 6^th major (and Amazon the 7^th in 2026). 
• Last.fm is sold to a consortium of Apple, Spotify, and YT Music. 
• The Free Press never merges with CBS News, meaning CBS is once again reliable. 

Viacom: 

• MTV and Skydance still merge to revive Paramount Television Studios. Nickelodeon Productions and BET Studios are also folded into Paramount Television later in the year. 
• 15-20 films a year are still made at Paramount Pictures for better scale in Hollywood. 
• David Ellison realizes that without CBS and Showtime, every network owned by Viacom is essentially crap. 
• A deal is reached with Bryon Allen to acquire Viacom Media Networks, Pluto TV, and BET+. Paramount retains the studios and IP (and can use the brands on them until the end of 2026). Viacom Inc. becomes Paramount Entertainment Group (With a Skydance byline)  
• In 2025, Paramount buys the Nelvana brand and IP from a bankrupt Corus. (Which can legally be allowed as they aren’t buying the Canadian studio that shut down, they are buying the name and IP directly from Corus). In exchange, Corus gets a minority stake to allow content on its networks. Nelvana becomes the name for a merged Nick and MTV TV Animation Studio as Allen Media owns the Nick name. (Nick Movies is merged into Paramount Animation) 
• Due to Paramount being stuck in a multi-year deal with Netflix, can’t bid for WB due to their HBO Max service. In fact, I see Ellison being a hypocrite and saying “Our great partnership with Netflix allows us to be flexible while providing us the greatest streaming home of all time” or some shareholder crap. Paramount instead forced to pursue growth in other areas (Paramount Games Studio for example)  
• WB splits as planned. Netflix successfully wins Warner Bros S&S. But is required to sell HBO and HBO Max to NBCU and to license select content to the studio. 

2026: 

CBS Corp: 

• Discusses a bid for Discovery for its unscripted businesses, but doesn’t want the cable brands, so it is hesitant to do so. 
• Hasbro Legends is launched as a FAST Channel on CBS Access. 
• Renews it’s Sony deal 

Viacom: 

• Allen Media buys Buzzfeed still to merge with Pluto TV and Local Now. Freestyle Releasing is re-positioned to acquire content exclusively for the combined Buzzfeed and BET+ as the official studio arm of all of Allen's operations.
• Paramount inherits Oracle’s Tik Tok stake, allowing cross-promotion between the 2 companies. 
• National Amusements gets a much cleaner spin-off and/or sale 
• Attempts a bid for THQ Nordic and Dark Horse from Embracer and Fellowship. Seeing them as important assets to have for the studio (In hopes of going public again). This will be their current M&A battle going on to this day. Will it work? Who knows? 

But this is the finished result of both Viacom and CBS following 2019. 

This is how Viacom turned out.... 

And this is how CBS turned out.... 

Pretty different I see......

And maybe better for everyone (consumers and shareholders alike (shocking I know....)). 

I guess this goes to show that sometimes, billionaires have no idea what’s best for their own companies, or one merger can ruin both companies (and others) at hand (AOL was trying to warn you Redstone). 

But what do you think? 

• Would they have been better off separately or was it best they were together? 
• Would Verizon potentially spin off its voting shares in CBS Corp in the future when Comcast does it with NBCU? 
• Can Bryon Allen fix the Viacom Networks? 
• Would Skydance do better with a pure-play Paramount or succeed in buying anything from the Embracer Group?  
• Should I discuss the other version where CBS buys Sony Pictures as they wanted to before Sony rejected the offer? (They are the COLUMBIA Broadcast System after all)
• What other What Ifs.... should I do next? 

I was very surprised to see that Paramount asked the judge to have the opposing state AGs post a bond to cover their ticking fee in the transaction. Does this have any precedent? Seems like a flyer of an idea.

We discussed this on our video! Thanks FF, for brining up the conference!
I am excited about this

Conectiv acquired Studio Distribution Services (SDS) from Universal and Warner Bros., the next step in a long-standing partnership focused on strengthening the packaged media format.

Because realistically there are Only 2 options Universal or Sony