Time Warner shares plummeted six percent Wednesday after the Justice Department threw a wrench in its plan to merge with telecommunications giant AT&T. Department officials are demanding that the company sell CNN.
The fake news network is owned by Turner Broadcasting, and the feds want them to sell it before the massive merger will be approved. If Time Warner complies with the demand, CNN will have a new home.
“We are in active discussions with the [Department of Justice]. Those are continuing on. I can’t comment on those discussions, but with those discussions, I can now say that the timing of the closing of the deal is now uncertain,” AT&T’s chief financial officer John Stephens.
“With regards to the transaction, everything continues as we’ve expressed in the past.”
It’s unclear if Time Warner will comply with the request. CNN has become a joke among serious journalists, but their brand of frothy lies are still popular with a certain segment of society. The network is worth a massive amount of money.
According to CNBC: “Stephens noted the AT&T acquisition of Time Warner is a ‘vertical integration’ merger across industries. He cited how the government has not blocked a ‘vertical’ deal in more than 40 years.
Time Warner shares dropped 4 percent on Nov. 2 after The Wall Street Journal reported that the Justice Department’s antitrust division is preparing for litigation in case it decides to sue to block the deal.”
AT&T’s shares, however, were unaffected.
Time Warner declined to comment on the ordeal.
(Source: CNBC)