Is the Warner Bros. Discovery Deal Set to Become a Cliffhanger?

Paramount Skydance launched a hostile takeover bid for Warner Bros. Discovery on Monday, intensifying the battle that began when Netflix announced a deal to acquire the HBO owner last week.

CEO David Ellison told investors that Paramount is “here to finish what we started,” and the company upped the offer to $30 per share in all‑cash, outbidding Netflix’s $27.75 per‑share cash‑and‑stock proposal for WBD’s streaming and studio assets.

Market reaction was immediate. Paramount shares jumped 9%, while Warner Bros. Discovery stock rose 4.4% on the news.

In a parallel development, the U.S. administration gave Nvidia permission to export its latest H200 artificial‑intelligence chips to “approved customers” in China and other markets, provided a portion of the revenue is repatriated to the United States. Nvidia’s stock ticked up about 2% in after‑hours trading.

Despite these headline‑making moves, major U.S. indexes slipped overnight as investors braced for the Federal Reserve’s final policy meeting of the year, scheduled for Wednesday. The CME FedWatch tool shows the market assigning roughly a 90% probability to a 25‑basis‑point rate cut.

“The market action you’ve seen the last one or two weeks is essentially pricing in a very high likelihood of a 25‑bp cut,” said Stephen Kolano, chief investment officer at Integrated Partners. “If the Fed decides not to cut, we could see a 2%–3% pull‑back across equities.”

Investors will be watching the Fed closely, hoping for a clear signal that can anchor market expectations heading into the next year.

Private credit is beginning to look like the bond market — and that comes with red flags.

Once confined to a niche corner of lending to mid‑size firms, private credit has expanded across sectors, borrower sizes and collateral types. Large allocators now treat it as part of the same opportunity set as high‑yield bonds and leveraged loans.

The convergence raises concerns. With more private lenders chasing a shrinking pool of blockbuster deals, underwriting standards are slipping toward the looser norms that characterized syndicated markets before the 2020 credit crunch.

— Lee Ying Shan