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The Town with Matthew Belloni

Paramount Isn’t Giving up Warner Bros. to Netflix Just Yet

The Town with Matthew Belloni

The Ringer

Society & Culture

4.31.1K Ratings

🗓️ 18 December 2025

⏱️ 36 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Matt is joined by Gerry Cardinale, founder and managing partner of RedBird Capital, to discuss Paramount’s bid for Warner Bros., why their bid is superior to Netflix’s bid, Larry Ellison and the Middle East's involvement, whether they will look to raise their bid, and what the next steps will be (02:33). Matt finishes the show with an opening weekend box office prediction for ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash' (29:44). For a 20 percent discount on Matt’s Hollywood insider newsletter, ‘What I’m Hearing ...,’ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠click here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Email us your thoughts! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠thetown@spotify.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Host: Matt Belloni Guest: Gerry Cardinale Producers: Craig Horlbeck and Jessie Lopez Theme Song: Devon Renaldo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Head home for the holidays with Abercrombie and Fitch. Between family dinners and making time to catch up with friends, my calendar gets booked up.

0:08.0

When I need to look put together, Abercrombie makes it easy to find outfits for all of my fans.

0:13.0

With their classic jumpers, essential hoodies and Abercrombie denim, I've got my holiday fits covered for the whole season.

0:20.0

Shop Abercrombie in the app, online, and in stores.

0:29.8

It is Thursday, December 18th.

0:32.7

Quite a development in the saga of who will buy the Warner Brothers Discovery Studio.

0:37.5

The board of the company didn't just reject the hostile takeover bid from Paramount.

0:41.4

They kind of eviscerated Paramount and the Ellison family in the process.

0:45.4

The 83-page SEC filing offers the Warner's version of events that led to Netflix

0:50.2

announcing its $83 billion acquisition of the studio and HBO Max on December 5th.

0:55.2

Remember, Paramount is now pushing a hostile bid of more than $100 billion for the whole

0:59.6

company, including the TV networks that are the subject of debate over how valuable they

1:04.1

will be on their own. In the new filing, Warner's called Paramount's $30 per share offer inferior

1:08.9

and inadequate. The Ellison's, quote, consistently misled

1:12.8

them and repeatedly failed to incorporate critical feedback regarding its equity financing.

1:18.5

The bid was portrayed as messy and filled with red flags. By contrast, they say, the Netflix

1:23.8

offer of more than $27 in cash and stock for just the studio in HBO Max,

1:29.0

which Warner's ended up accepting, was a, quote, clean bid without questions around who is

1:34.1

ultimately accountable and without Middle East money. That's a key point. After all, the Ellisons

1:38.7

are putting in only $12 billion of equity. I say only as if $12 billion dollars is only, but it's only $12 billion in

1:45.7

their bid. And they recruited funds in Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi and Qatar to put in additional

1:51.6

money, about $24 billion, double the amount of the family, though the fund associated with

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