David Ellison is celebrating in style after completing Paramount's Warner Bros. Discovery merger, forming media giant Skydance. Ellison and his leadership team rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday morning in New York's Financial District, days after addressing staff on Skydance's first day.
I've closely followed the Paramount-WBD saga for nearly a year including: So when I saw Ellison and company ring the bell on Wall Street, it felt like a symbolic way to close this chapter of Skydance's story — even though the real action is just beginning.
While Skydance executives were in celebration mode on Thursday, they face a litany of challenges, including a roughly $80 billion debt load and potent competition in streaming from the likes of Netflix, Disney, and YouTube. Although HBO Max and Paramount+ may be stronger together, Ellison and Skydance's leaders need to figure out how to integrate their streamers.
Skydance shares rose more than 5% on Thursday but are down 30% this year and have lost nearly half their value in the last 12 months. Those losses didn't stop Ellison from projecting confidence. "We are positioned to win in every single vertical that we operate in," Ellison told CNBC at the NYSE before ringing the opening bell.
"By combining Paramount and Warner Bros., we have the greatest content engine with marquee intellectual property." Here are 18 photos I took at Skydance's opening bell ceremony.