Media mogul Barry Diller in talks to acquire Paramount: NYT

Media mogul and IAC Chairman Barry Diller is reportedly exploring a bid to acquire Paramount Global (PARA), according to New York Times reports, after his company signed non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) and is seemingly in talks with majority stakeholder National Amusements. Diller also sits as the chairman and senior executive of the Expedia Group (EXPE).

The Morning Brief's Brad Smith and Madison Mills report on the news and what this could mean for Paramount's future.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Morning Brief.

This post was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.

Video Transcript

Shares of Paramount.

We are seeing them higher by about 4% as we begin the trading session after media mogul Barry Diller is exploring a bid to take control of Paramount, The New York Times reporting on Monday.

Diller's company, I AC, has signed non disclosure agreements and with National Amusements, the company that owns a controlling stake in Paramount Global sources say now this marks the latest bid for the streaming giant after Sky Dance Media ended merger negotiations with Paramount.

It seems like this is the song that will never end and it goes on and on and the stock keeps moving, my friend, uh, from Paramount, as there are, of course, different, uh, machinations to each of the bids that get put forward here, it seems, though, um, because A.

And we should also remember Diller's kind of historical relationship with Paramount.

He was the head of Paramount Pictures, Um, about you know, Well, at 32 years old, about 50 years ago, it seems like yeah, um, and ultimately he was outbid for the company.

Sumner Redstone outbid him, um, and took control of the company, which reportedly was close to a deal with David Ellison sky dance as well.

We know this.

So all of this considered there is a little bit of that kind of personal, uh, annexation to this Paramount brand for Diller.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's interesting, too, because he was kind of running the more media studio side of things and again, to your point.

But but Sherry Redstone was able to, you know, obviously today, holding that controlling stake in the voting shares of Paramount after her father did outbid Diller back in the nineties.

Four.

Company control.

But we're seeing the shares reacting to this news still today, following this news reporting that we got yesterday originally from The New York Times on Barry Diller here, the stock is up about 3.8%.

It was up over 4% after the news has seen a positive reaction here.

I think there's a potential here that shareholders are just looking for this story to wrap up so that they can find out how their shares are going to be impacted by this news and maybe some bullishness over the idea of just getting some answers here.

Yeah, absolutely.

All right, we're continuing to track this one.

It's been a dozy over the past year, down 34%