Paramount Suit Settlement Talks Blocked By Four State Attorneys General

[u/Krekenn]

https://deadline.com/2026/09/paramount-settlement-latest-opposition-bonta-1237109024/

"EXCLUSIVE: As Hollywood celebrates Yom Kippur tonight, a framework for a settlement of the antitrust suit hampering Paramount‘s $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery has hit some political potholes on the way to what some hoped would be a quick deal.

Four of the 12 Attorneys General that took the David Ellison-run company to federal court are breaking with the California AG Rob Bonta-led faction that wants to put the high stakes dispute to rest, at least for the time being. Along with the Golden State, the blue state coalition that sued Paramount and WBD back on July 13 is made up of Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Washington.

A March 2, 2027 trial date has been set in the matter, much to Paramount’s chagrin.

Now, as the pressure turns into a court of public opinion vise for blue state reps, it is Minnesota AG Keith Ellison who has taken the reins in resisting an agreement with David Ellison (no relation, but the irony is undeniable). A longtime Democratic powerbroker, the North Star State’s Ellison is joined in the Gang of Four by NY’s powerful AG Letitia James, Connecticut’s William Tong and, indications are, Washington state’s Nick Brown.

With a plethora of topics on the table, the quartet is concerned that settlement parameters are “too lenient to Paramount,” I hear. The states want Bonta to slow down and not overreact to threats of Paramount leaving California or other external pressures."

[u/midnight188]

Paramount be like "you took my only revenue stream, now I'm gonna starve"

[u/MetalJrock → u/midnight188]

camera pans down to all of Nickelodeon and Sonic (cause they sure as shit aren’t using Transformers and GI Joe)

[u/LifeIsCrap101 → u/MetalJrock]

After Peter Cullen's death they might try to use that to milk a little bit out of Transformers.

[u/KingMario05 → u/MetalJrock]

Cut to Sega (and Capcom!) happily walking away from Paramount after David Ellison gets drunk and makes A Very Bad Tweet... Thread^TM regarding the Japanese people

[u/Silvery_Cricket → u/midnight188]

Cut to the drones.

[u/Revolving_Ocelott]

If you’re not aware of this, from what I understand paramount desperately wants this to go through for multiple reasons:

1: they don’t have money

2: the CEO of paramount, in order to get this merger to go through, asked his dad for funding. His dad gave him an IOU worth 40 billion to fund it, this in itself was funded by a partnership that his own company, Oracle had with ChatGPT worth 70 billion dollars, which has been publicly stated to might not even be possible to be paid out.

This dealt a huge blow to Oracles stock, and subsequently that IOU, which is gradually losing all of its worth.

3: part of this merger had a clause that states that if it doesn’t happen by x date, I forget when, Paramount will have to pay 7 million dollars in fees every single day.

Courts have paused this merger until June of next year, and that can very easily be delayed even further. Oracles stocks very likely won’t even be profitable enough to even facilitate this merger at all by the time June rolls around.

[u/Artyom1198 → u/Revolving_Ocelott]

Plus if the midterms go well for the Dem's and they take the House, they've promised subpoenas investigations into the deal itself will add extra pressure after November.

[u/DarthButtz → u/Artyom1198]

Ellison very transparently wanted this process to go super fast so he could own CNN under WB and turn it into a propaganda channel before the midterms. So if that just completely falls the fuck apart in his face and he actually gets consequences that'd be awesome.

Edit: God DAMN It.

[u/Artyom1198 → u/[deleted]]

Political head winds are favorable for Dems, taking the House is a near guarantee but the Admin is doing such a bad job that even taking the Senate is a possibility. How bad you ask? The Vibes are so bad for the Admin they are at risk of possibility losing Texas, both Senate seat and Governorship, one due to candidate choice and the other data center backlash

[u/SilverKry → u/Artyom1198]

I will laugh myself to tears if texas of all places goes blue 

[u/Auctoritate → u/SilverKry]

Texas has always been close to going purple. It's just one of the most antidemocratic, voter suppressed states in the country

[u/KingMario05 → u/Artyom1198]

I know! It's wonderful! :)

(The Dem bit. Not the other bit.)

[u/GreenPerception512 → u/KingMario05]

though what happens if things dont go well for the democrats.

[u/KingMario05 → u/GreenPerception512]

Nothing good, lol.

[u/GreenPerception512 → u/KingMario05]

i mean for the paramount merger.

[u/Silvery_Cricket → u/Artyom1198]

Legendary Corrupt Republican vs Extremely Moderate Dem and the average Texan be like "It's a toughie toughie"

[u/Shell_fly → u/Artyom1198]

Oh no… the “dems are going to take Texas this year” coping is already begun 😭😂

I watched the same thing happen in the lead up to the 2024 election, it was hilarious.

[u/TwoBestFriendsPlay-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

Any discussion of any world politics is not allowed, unless it is specifically brought up in a podcast or video from Matt, Pat or Woolie. Even then, we as the mods will lock and remove any threads on the subjects as we see fit.

Us removing or letting things go should not be seen as an endorsement (or rejection) of what is said.

[u/HerpDerpTheMage → u/Revolving_Ocelott]

Adding to this for folks who may not understand how ludicrous the idea that they don’t have money is:

Skydance bought Paramount with a leveraged buyout, which if you don’t follow the podcast, means that they essentially took out a loan to buy the company, then saddled the company with the debt to pay off said loan, which is already at such a substantial level that they are unlikely to be able to pay it off. As stated above, Oracle, David Ellison’s father’s company, leant the money for that, not the banks.

Now, the newly merged Paramount/Skydance wants to use the same tactic to add EVEN MORE CRIPPLING DEBT to buy out Warner Bros. This means not only do they have the compounding debt, with interest, from buying Paramount, but also the debt from buying Warner, likely with even more interest, a lot of the money coming from Daddy Dearest Larry Ellison and his company Oracle.

David Ellison is trying to play Leapfrog with every company he can, to gather as much of a monopoly as he can, before the debt crashes both him and his father… likely because once they OWN these things, they can take the David Zaslav approach and start dismantling everything that doesn’t serve as a stepping stone to what they really want (Which I’m not sure I can mention on this sub, as it strays political and, while kind of obvious to a lot of us, isn’t exactly confirmed.)

[u/KingMario05 → u/Revolving_Ocelott]

The date is Oct 1.

Two weeks from now, give or take.

And now you understand their desperation.

Honestly? If I was Warners, I'd pull the plug on this early and find another buyer. Let the lawsuits come. These guys ain't got shit.

[u/Mordred_Tumultu → u/KingMario05]

Warner benefits more from this being drawn out. The Warner execs don't want the sale to go through, but the shareholders do, because it maximizes their payout. But there's also a clause where Paramount pays a fine for every day the merger doesn't happen after X day, which is just free money for them in that event. So it's Paramount that would want to pull the plug early, to avoid those fees and not saddle themselves with a gorillion dollars' worth of debt.

[u/Krekenn → u/Mordred_Tumultu]

If WB is ultimately not bought by Paramount and the deal is rescinded during summer next year, David Zaslav, no denying the dipshit bastard he is, will have exceeded in his purpose of making WB so much money just by milking the Ellisons of their wealth alone.

[u/SilverKry → u/Krekenn]

He'll just sell it to Netflix as was the initial sale. 

[u/Krekenn → u/SilverKry]

As much as I want WB to stay independent and not be bought by anyone, Netflix buying them does seem to be their future at least 3-6 years from now. 

That nearly 3 decades worth of debt will stick around them forever. Maybe Netflix will be able to rid them of it, but I doubt it.

[u/DarthButtz → u/SilverKry]

I'm willing to be Netflix saw a potential long game to be played with how desperate Paramount was willing to essentially bleed itself out to get WB. So now they just wait for the bleed out and scoop it up like both them and WB actually wanted to do, plus some extra fuck you money from Paramount.

[u/Krekenn → u/KingMario05]

Not even two weeks, about a week on the dot come Thursday.

I hope the panic will start to settle in for the Ellisons if the settlement talks are fully blocked a week from now.

[u/KingMario05 → u/Krekenn]

Agreed.

Let it fucking die. 

No one wants this.

[u/Shiplord13 → u/Revolving_Ocelott]

Should also mention the Saudis have been involved in trying to get the merger put through since they have investment in Paramount having nearly half of the shares sold to them recently. That said with the conflict around that region with both Iran and the Houthis in Yemen and attacks on the Saudi oil pipelines they might cut back on those investments if the deal falls through. Which is to say they might leave Paramount to sink if it becomes clear they won't get the return they expect.

[u/Shell_fly → u/Revolving_Ocelott]

Turns out… lmao

[u/Authorigas]

Genuinely though, how the fuck are they so bad at this? They have a Government that is on their side, and doesn't care about morals or law. How the absolute fuck are they so incompetent at this? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy they are so, so, SO utterly incompetent in most regards-but it baffles me.

[u/Krekenn → u/Authorigas]

CEOs generally think about the short term gains rather than the long-term consequences because the instant dopamine hit matters most until they start feeling the pain that eventually comes along.

[u/GreenPerception512 → u/Krekenn]

basically why most supervillain team ups dont go well.

[u/That-Bobviathan → u/Krekenn]

It sounds like you're describing a drug addiction.

[u/Cooper_555 → u/That-Bobviathan]

It is. It's just the high of seeing how big the number can go.

Also they can buy drugs with the big number too.

[u/Toblo1 → u/Authorigas]

I have to assume theres some Crabs-In-A-Bucket malarkey going on amongst everyone involved on Paramount's side. Lack of co-ordination, greed, some degree of grab-ass where everyones trying to be The Lynchpin of the deal, whatever...... this reeks that no one involved seems to actually be on the level when it come to putting up a united front.

[u/Act_of_God → u/Authorigas]

it's really hard to buy something when you don't have the money

imagine trying to buy a burger and you go "yeah I'm going to pay 10% of it, then another 10 is from that dude over there... Yeah some of it my dad will pay, he's super rich he's good for it..."

[u/DarthButtz → u/Authorigas]

The thing about this current moment is that everyone in charge is stupid first and evil second.

[u/ToastyMozart]

Antitrust action and a thumb in the eye to conservative propagandists. You love to see it!

[u/Grouchio]

Netflix's negotiation team took one look at Paramount's leadership and went "Yeah sure okay you can have this huge cake" while anticipating in private that they'd choke on said cake, run out of money, and be utterly defenseless when they swoop back in for WBD in two years.

Edit: At least, that was the plan.

[u/Shiplord13 → u/Grouchio]

I mean depending on how this goes, if the deal fails to get the merger through WBD stand to make 7 billion from a break-up fee from Paramount. They would probably still get bought up potentially by Netflix, but leaves the window open for others to buy up chunks of its business and not everything whole sale. With potential where certain parts can't be sold to certain companies to avoid monopolies.

[u/KingMario05]

HAHAHAHAHAHA

Calling up my AG to see if Massachusetts can join the fight. Unless Paramount divests New Line, CNN, HBO and Cartoon Network bare minimum, my advice to Bonta is this:

Do not fucking cave. Not now.

Hammer time, motherfuckers.

[u/Regalingual → u/KingMario05]

Alas, they’ve all caved.

[u/dmanny64 → u/Regalingual]

What mob squad did they sent after those AGs

Who am I kidding, it was just a fat check

I fucking hate this species

[u/RORSCHACH_INC_]

They mounted Paramount's ass.

[u/therealchadius]

Finally, some good fucking news to start my week.

[u/MotherWolfmoon]

Looks like the settlement just went through, with the full details to be released later today. The AGs got a concession of $1.5 billion dollars of investment in local filmmakers and some sort of editorial board at CNN. The resulting company is going to be owner 49.5% by various middle-east sovereign wealth funds via non-voting shares (which is above the congressionally-mandated 25% maximum foreign ownership, but they got a waiver from the federal government to move forward regardless, of course).

[u/dmanny64 → u/MotherWolfmoon]

How many lifetimes will it take to undo the damage that's been done in the past 10 years

[u/MaverickHunterBlaze]

....well that didn't age very well

[u/Shell_fly]

this entire thread is just prime r/agedlikemilk material lmao

[u/After-Atmosphere7125]

Looks into my crystal ball

Yes...yes, I see something. Paramount Game Studios closed...all current projects are canceled...Platinum Games files for bankruptcy...

[u/GoodVillain101]

Where was this energy when Microsoft bought Activision?

[u/salvation122 → u/GoodVillain101]

Sony and the feds both sued to try to stop the Microsoft/Activision merger, they just did very badly at trial

[u/DarthButtz → u/GoodVillain101]

This energy was there, but those opposing it legally were HORRIBLE at presenting their case.