Despite outside appearances that there isn’t a single person in entertainment in favor of the pending Paramount Skydance–Warner Bros. merger — or, rather, anyone not motivated purely by greed — the transaction appears to be inching its way toward completion. Last week, Paramount Skydance cleared its largest obstacle since outbidding Netflix for the company in February when current shareholders of Warner Bros. Discovery approved the proposed terms of the deal. But this unholy union isn’t completely in the clear yet, and there are still several potential regulatory and practical roadblocks that could stop it from coming to fruition.
Paramount is under pressure to get the deal done in a timely manner because if it fails to close by September 30, it has to pay Warner Bros. Discovery stockholders a fee of 25 cents per share for each quarter until closing. If it doesn’t close at all, it will owe Warner Bros. a termination fee of $7 billion. Vulture spoke with Alvaro Bedoya, former commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, and Corey Martin, chair of Granderson Des Rochers, LLP’s entertainment-finance practice, to understand the various hurdles that could still alter, delay, or prevent the deal from going through.
