UPDATE 8-Warner Bros Discovery rejects Paramount offer, source says, company ponders sale options

(Recasts with details from source that Warner Bros Discovery's board rejected a new offer from Paramount, paragraphs 1-4 and 9) * WBD rejects Paramount offer of nearly $24/share, source says * Potential buyer may also have to take over WBD's $35 billion debt * WBD's shares rise 11% By Harshita Mary Varghese, Jaspreet Singh and Dawn Chmielewski Oct 21 (Reuters) – Warner Bros Discovery's board rejected a nearly $60 billion offer from Paramount Skydance on Tuesday, a source said, and the company announced it would explore its options for the sale of the company. Reuters exclusively reported that the company's board rejected a mostly cash offer of nearly $24 a share for the company, whose assets include the Warner Bros film and television studios, its CNN and other cable television networks and its HBO Max streaming service, according to a source familiar with the matter. Shares of the company closed 11% higher on Tuesday. Warner Bros and Paramount declined to comment. Comcast is likely to examine the media firm's assets, another source told Reuters on Tuesday. Netflix is also among the interested parties, CNBC reported, following earlier reports that Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison was also in talks to acquire the whole company. Warner Bros — the studio behind the "Harry Potter" and DC Comics film franchises — announced plans in June to split into studio-centric and cable-focused units by next year to separate its growing streaming business from its lagging cable network unit. The board will consider a range of options including its planned separation, a deal for the entire company, or separate transactions for its Warner Bros or Discovery Global businesses, the company said on Tuesday. It is also considering an alternative separation structure that would enable a merger of Warner Bros and a spinoff of Discovery Global. SALE COULD RESHAPE MEDIA LANDSCAPE A sale or a split would be one of the most consequential moments reshaping the media industry. Streaming has fundamentally transformed the industry, stealing the audiences for traditional television broadcasts, and sapping advertising revenue. Any deal for Warner Bros Discovery would give the buyer control of a major studio and a leading streaming service, but also saddle it with the company's roughly $35 billion debt. Shares of WBD, which has a market valuation of $45.36 billion, have surged more than 46% since early September, when reports of Paramount's interest in the company surfaced. "Paramount is the most likely to purchase the company. For Netflix, a purchase would make more sense following the planned split because the studio would be very valuable to Netflix but the TV networks not as much," said eMarketer senior analyst Ross Benes. The company already rejected an initial bid from Paramount because the offer of around $20 per share was too low, two sources told Reuters. Bank of America research analyst Jessica Reif Ehrlich estimated the whole company was worth $30 per share, given its assets, and noted that WBD was not commenting on the offers. "Given the company's wealth of premium IP (Harry Potter, DC, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, etc.) and robust library, we continue to believe Warner Bros is an extremely attractive potential acquisition target," she wrote in an investor note. Comcast is in the process of spinning off its NBCUniversal cable channels, including USA Network and CNBC, into a new company called Versant later this year. "Potential WBD suitors, including Paramount, Comcast, Netflix, Amazon and Apple, could see value in moving sooner rather than later to acquire the entirety of WBD versus waiting to purchase just the streaming and studios assets," said Seth Shafer, principal analyst at S&P Global Market Intelligence Kagan. Netflix did not immediately respond to Reuters' request for comment. ELLISON FAMILY'S AMBITIONS Skydance's advances soon after snapping up Paramount speak to the Ellison family's voracious appetite to dominate the global media landscape amid a favorable regulatory regime in the United States. Analysts believe David Ellison's deep pockets — backed by his father, Oracle co-founder and the world's second-richest person Larry Ellison — give him the firepower to take the risk. The elder Ellison's close ties with U.S. President Donald Trump may also smooth regulatory hurdles and avoid the scrutiny that would usually come with such a merger, analysts say. (Reporting by Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles; Harshita Mary Varghese and Jaspreet Singh in Bengaluru and Milana Vinn in New York; Editing by Leroy Leo and Matthew Lewis)

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