Paramount‑Skydance Clears Antitrust Hurdle, Paving Way for $110B Warner Bros. Discovery Merger

Paramount Skydance has settled with 12 state attorneys general, clearing the last legal obstacle to its roughly $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. David Ellison told reporters the companies now expect to close in approximately two weeks, a sharp acceleration from the March 2027 trial date the litigation had been heading toward.

The settlement carries real operating commitments rather than a simple dismissal. Paramount agreed to a minimum of 30 films a year for the first two years and 32 a year for the following three, plus at least $300 million a year in added US production spending. A ticking fee of about $7 million a day begins accruing to Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders if the deal has not closed past September 30, which is what gives the two-week timeline its teeth.

The market split the reaction along deal-risk lines. PSKY opened sharply higher at $10.32, up 4% in morning trading, before settling back to around $10.11 later in the session, while WBD sat essentially flat near $30.83 after already gaining 8% over the prior month. In other words the legal risk had been priced into the acquirer, not the target. Both tickers are drawing extreme attention on our own data, each running close to five standard deviations above its normal mention volume.

Political objections survived the settlement. Senator Elizabeth Warren said that "allowing one Trump-aligned, foreign-owned conglomerate to dominate American news and entertainment is a disastrous outcome", and California Attorney General Rob Bonta framed the agreement as a resolution rather than an endorsement. Analysts also flag the financial shape of what emerges: the combined company is expected to carry roughly $80 billion in debt while meeting the production floors it just agreed to, against an in-house domestic production share currently near 5%. That combination is the reason NFLX drew attention on the news, up about 2% on the announcement day, with the argument being that Netflix benefits from a leveraged rival more than it would have from owning the assets itself.

What to watch from here is the judicial sign-off the settlement still requires, whether the close lands inside Ellison's two-week window or starts paying the daily fee, and the first concrete guidance on how the production and editorial-independence commitments will be funded.