The Paramount/Skydance merger remains in limbo, unless Donald Trump’s $20bn lawsuit over a TV interview is settled in his favour.
Had the US election result gone the other way at the end of last year, then – amongst many other things – there’s a strong chance that the proposed takeover/merger between Skydance and Paramount would now be complete.
However, under the current administration, a major sticking point has been a $20bn lawsuit that US President Donald Trump launched against CBS News – a part of the Paramount empire – over an interview it ran with Kamala Harris.
Trump took umbrage with the interview that ran on the TV show 60 Minutes, alleging violations of the Deceptive Trade Practices Act. And now he’s using his position in office to seemingly block the Skydance/Paramount deal, unless there’s some kind of settlement in his favour.
Shari Redstone, the current owner of Paramount, is thus stuck. And like many before – Facebook, Apple et al – there’s the sinking realisation that the proverbial ring needs to be kissed.
It’s being widely reported in the US that an eight-figure settlement figure has been demanded by Trump’s team, and by the sounds of it, they’re likely to get it. Once that’s paid, and presumably Trump’s team have extracted some public words of contrition, then the multi-billion-dollar merger can go through.
For Shari Redstone and her team, the likelihood is that they see this as the cost of doing business. Kiss the ring, write a cheque, say some words they don’t necessarily mean, and get on with life.
This is the Trump playbook, of course, and you’ll find plenty of discourse about that pretty much everywhere else on the internet. At the heart of this story though are thousands of employees around the world, already facing uncertainty, who have found that uncertainty extended in the ongoing game of buffering a man’s ego.
More as we hear it.
