How Will It Affect Viacom and CBS?
The Redstone family just can’t seem to get along. Sumner Redstone, the chairman of Viacom (VIA) and CBS Corp. (CBS) is once again battling with his daughter Shari Redstone, CEO of privately held National Amusements.The father and daughter have long clashed. He controls 80 percent of the movie theater chain, and she controls 20 percent and he’s made it clear she’s not going to succeed him as chairman of the two media giants. Last year Sumner also said that he was negotiating to buy out Shari’s stake in National Amusements. This latest clash speaks to Viacom and CBS’s low stock prices (and valuations) and the credit crunch facing media companies, and everyone.Here’s what happened: On Monday National Amusements was forced to sell $233 of stock in Viacom and CBS. On Monday the Wall Street Journal reported that National Amusements needed to raise cash to comply with debt covenants on a $1.6 billion loan, used in part to expand the business. On Tuesday the company said the sale was prompted
