☀️ PARAMOUNT: What's Actually About to Happen
SKYDANCE finally speaks as deal leaps ahead -- how big are the cuts and what's the big plan
The Great PARAMOUNT Mountain Sale
Well, it’s at least almost sold. Shari Redstone still has 45 days to find another deal 🧐 (until about August 22) — which would also need to incorporate a nice $400M breakup fee check to Larry Ellison & REDBIRD, so let’s — for the love of all things good and holy — assume that this is the deal y’all, unless the Feds somehow find a major issue, or uh Wayne Huizenga Jr. suddenly enters the fray.
Before diving into the particulars of what’s exactly going on here — it’s important to note that this SKYDANCE deal isn’t expected to close until a year from now (Q3 ‘25).
As CBS is involved in this whole shebang, the Feds certainly will take their time with a look-see.
Not that there’s anything particularly troublesome from an FCC license POV, but keep in mind how a regime change next January could come into play.
ALTHOUGH: Presumably the Trump Republican administration wouldn’t hold up a Larry Ellison deal — $15M in Republican midterm election money goes a long way.
AND: David Ellison has the Dems side covered.
THUS: The Office of the CEO is in charge for at least another year, and can safely start planning the Christmas party — any leads on venues that have 3 equal, separate rooms for 3 different DJs, contact PAR Corp Comms (btw Brian’s already called the hip-hop room).
See ya on the Q2 earnings call next month fellas (and the uh, following 4 calls).
Now, instead of sorting through 26 alerts from the trades in your inbox, each sharing slivers of the various aspects here — I had the wild idea that hey, why not lay it all out in one place and add some key context?
Let’s dive in to take a look at:
What’s really driving this deal
Which PAR divisions look steady (and which divisions may want to update their LinkedIns)
What David Ellison & Jeff Shell are counting on for growth
How long it took “New PARAMOUNT” leadership on the investors call to even mention the business that represents more than 50% of PARAMOUNT’s current revenues (Hint: It wasn’t in the first 10 minutes), and laying out exactly what Ellison & co. are walking into here come late 2025
And of course, what’s next