Ellison Meets Trump Ahead of NBC Comment: $30/WBD Takeover Bid vs Netflix

Paramount Pictures CEO David Ellison met President Trump in the White House early last week, days before Trump stated on Wednesday he would not interfere in the bidding war over Warner Bros. Discovery between Paramount and Netflix. Paramount is pursuing a $30-per-share all-cash bid for WBD, seeking to block Netflix’s pending $7.5B acquisition of Warner Bros. and HBO. The Justice Department is reviewing the deal amid antitrust concerns and a subpoena, per The Wall Street Journal, while Netflix said it is not aware of any investigations beyond standard merger reviews. The split of WBD into two publicly traded entities later this year means Discovery Global will own CNN and other channels, while HBO and the movie studio are targeted for Netflix’s potential acquisition.