Paramount Eyes Elon Musk For Investment As WBD Deal Nears Finish Line

Paramount executives have discussed seeking an equity investment from Elon Musk as they prepare to close the acquisition of Warner. Bros. Discovery, according to a Semafor report today.

Larry Ellison had personally committed to backstop over $40 billion in equity financing for the mega-deal to get Warner to agree to sell itself to Paramount. A trio of Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds led by Saudi Arabia agreed to come on as investors, defraying his costs, and will wind up with hefty combined equity stake in the combined company of just under 50%. Semafor said Musk is one of a number of wealthy individuals that Paramount, led by CEO David Ellison, has considered approaching to join a syndicate of equity investors into the company.

Paramount declined to comment.

Larry Ellison and Musk are friendly with the Oracle co-founder investing $1 billion in Musk’s takeover of Twitter (now X) in 2022. Ellison also invested in Musk’s automaker Tesla and served on its board of directors from 2018 to 2022.

But Musk is also controversial and any investment of his in the parent company of CBS News and CNN would be as well.

An eventual investment by the world’s richest man could come to light in future SEC filings depending on the size.

Paramount now has a mostly clear path to clinch its WBD acquisition after settling an antitrust lawsuit with a dozen State Attorneys General led by California AG Rob Bonta. The agreement was announced Sept. 21 and according to Paramount the deal should take about two weeks to officially close.

The last remaining hurdle is the federal judge in the case who must approve the settlement, called a consent decree. She called a hearing for Thursday to “address certain outstanding questions regarding the factual and legal underpinnings of the parties proposed consent decree, as well as the implementation of the proposed consent decree.”

The agreement surprised many in the industry as it seemed to go light on Paramount, without any of the tough structural remedies that Bonta had said repeatedly said would be necessary for a settlement. Paramount instead committed mostly to so-called behavioral remedies, or promises that are legally enforceable by a court.

Since the settlement this week, according to Bloomberg, bankers have started reaching out to investors ahead of the sale of $49 billion in debt financing that is the other piece backing the acquisition.

Bank of America, Citigroup and Apollo underwrote the buyout debt package, one of the biggest ever, to fund the takeover. Bloomberg said there was significant investor demand before the deal was halted by the AGs lawsuit. The package, the report says, includes a mix of about $30 billion of investment-grade bonds; $7.5 billion of investment-grade loans; and some $12 billion of second-lien bonds.