And the political wrangling at and around entertainment giant Paramount (PARA) only continues. New reports say that the California State Senate is throwing in on the action, and is also concerned about plans to settle the lawsuit with President Trump. Like “it might be bribery” concerned. And the word did little to satisfy shareholders, as shares slipped modestly in the closing minutes of Monday’s trading.
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The California Senate’s Energy, Utilities and Communications committee, along with the Judiciary committee, sent letters to Wendy McMahon—who you might remember as the former president of CBS News—as well as Bill Owens, former executive producer of 60 Minutes—to testify as part of an investigation into the Trump / Paramount lawsuit.
The testimony the committees are looking for, reports note, focuses on several points, including whether or not newsroom staffers objected to the settlement, what impact the potential settlement had on “editorial decisions,” whether anyone expressed an opinion on “…the weakness of the lawsuit’s claims,” and whether anyone thought settling the lawsuit would be “advantageous or necessary” to get the Skydance merger to go through. Paramount’s representatives, meanwhile, would not comment on the matter.
Front-Loading Grief
Meanwhile, reports note that Leslie Stahl, one of 60 Minutes’ staff, is not taking the whole Paramount settlement concept very well, and expects to be “mourning” and “grieving” soon. Stahl is convinced that there will be a settlement, some money will change hands, and as far as Stahl is concerned, this will be a huge blow to journalism everywhere.
“We will hopefully still be around, turning a new page and finding out what that new page is going to look like,” Stahl noted. Stahl also noted the declining of trust in media with the public, but seemed more interested in blaming Trump himself than the decades of media behavior before Trump. In fact, Stahl noted that the public “…doesn’t seem to want what we do to be part of our public life.”
Is Paramount Stock a Good Buy Right Now?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Hold consensus rating on PARA stock based on two Buys, eight Holds and four Sells assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 5.47% loss in its share price over the past year, the average PARA price target of $12.18 per share implies 2.14% upside potential.
