Paramount Stock Dips After Company Ends Its Effort To Sell A Stake In BET Media Group
deadline.comParamount Global shares dipped 2% Thursday morning after word surfaced Wednesday night that the company had abandoned its effort to sell a stake in BET Media Group.
Shares fell at one point to $14.58, their lowest level since mid-May, though trading volume was lighter than normal. A source familiar with the discussions told Deadline that Paramount informed bidders for a stake in BET that the process had been halted because the company concluded it wouldn’t create enough value or result in a meaningful reduction of debt.
The company has been looking for opportunities to streamline, and just last week announced the sale of book publishing unit Simon & Schuster to KKR for $1.62 billion.
Like its media industry peers, Paramount is contending with a secular decline in lucrative pay-TV subscribers at the same time it is looking to make inroads in the capital-intensive direct-to-consumer streaming business.
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