The pending merger between AT&T’s WarnerMedia and Discovery, Inc. has won the approval of U.S. antitrust regulators, the companies announced on Wednesday in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
In the filing, obtained by TheWrap, the governmental regulatory waiting periods expired, therefore satisfying the closing condition of the merger plan initially announced on May 17, 2021. Now all that stands in the way of the Q2 merger is a Discovery shareholder vote, which should not be a problem.
AT&T is spinning off WarnerMedia in a $43 billion deal with Discovery, Inc. Longtime Discovery chief David Zaslav will run the new company, which will trade as WBD on the NASDAQ Global Select Market. (AT&T will continue on as a telecom-focused business, trading under its current symbol, T.)
When the merger was announced by AT&T last May, the full valuation of the combined company was estimated at $130 billion. In June 2021, it was announced that the new moniker for the combined entities is Warner Bros. Discovery.
The merger will put Warner Bros., CNN, Turner and Discovery’s stable of nonfiction networks under one roof — as well as two competing streaming services, Discovery+ and HBO Max. It also combines WarnerMedia’s U.S. sports rights like the NBA, MLB and March Madness with Discovery international sports giant Eurosport.