This isn't about sob stories, its about what is best for WBD shareholders and really the industry as a whole.
deadline.com
They had a goal of $30 a share that was met.
Yes, Paramount met that with an all cash offer of $30/share, Netflix did not. Netflix's bid was $27.75/share in a mix of cash and stock.
Netflix did not bid for the entire company, WBD will be able to sell the cable channels for an additional $3-5 a share, not the $1 a share that Ellison has claimed in his tantrums.
That makes an assumption on the value of those assets which are not backed by anyone. Wall St so far has valued the linear assets at $2-3/share not $3-5. Also last I checked $30-$27.75 was $2.25, meaning Paramount's bid is within that $2-3/share that is believed to be fetched for the linear assets.
TouchéIs it surprising? What's not lagging or worse this year in the US?
You think people have $20 billion just lying around? The Ellison group had a hard time putting together the $30 offer. Most of the WBD stock is owned by Newhouse, Vanguard and BlackRock, all of whom have executives who sit on the WBD board and were part of the decision to sell the company to Netflix.
Very few people on the planet have that kind of cash lying around, not even Netflix. Netflix is also having to go get a $59B unsecured bridge loan financing from multiple banks to make this deal, among the largest in the industry. So they are also going into debt over this.
To win they would need to get to $35 which will not be easy. Shareholders are not going to care about Ellison’s sob stories.
I don't know where you're coming up with that number, as you're the only one I've seen on the internet say that specific number. That would indicate that WBD is valuing the linear assets at close to $7/share, not happening. As again Wall St has indicated that the linear assets would likely fetch $2-3/share in the open market making it a max of $31-32/share combined. But even if that is what WBD wants because they value the linear assets as higher, then request either to raise their bids and let whomever has the higher offer win out. Also I don't think the Ellison's will have any issue securing additional financing if they need it, they already have indicated they can go above $30/share if needed. And I expect them to increase it, as the current $30/share is likely just the beginning. Its classic Ellison negotiating, you start low and come up as needed. If you'd followed the families history in business you'd know that. So no they didn't have an issue putting together $30/share, don't believe whatever Reddit you got that from. This is one of the richest families on the planet. They just weren't going to go right out give the highest offer they could the first time. $30/share wasn't even their best and final offer either, they were never allowed to give one because WBD never asked for one.
Paramount will have to pay the nearly $3 billion break up fee. Larry isn’t going to sell more of his Oracle stock to fund his son’s misadventures, at least I personally would be shocked if he did. He only put up $11 billion of his own money in the current bid.
Then you don't know Larry very well. Also he doesn't have to sell stock, that is not what the rich do. They leverage its future value to get more money, Elon has been doing that for decades. So he doesn't have to sell one bit of stock to finance this.
