Netflix walked away from Warner Bros. Discovery on February 26, 2026, announcing it declined to raise its offer after the board flagged a superior proposal, per Netflix's own statement. One day later, on February 27, Paramount Skydance and WBD signed an asset purchase agreement worth $110.9 billion — $31 per share in cash, per Paramount's announcement.
The final week moved fast. WBD reopened talks with Paramount on February 17 after Netflix granted a seven-day waiver; by February 24, WBD confirmed receipt of Paramount's revised offer, and reports put the likely number at $32. The landing zone, $31, was still $3.25 above the $27.75 Netflix had signed for in December.
Why Netflix Quit Instead of Paying
Netflix's own words did the math: the deal was, in its telling, no longer financially attractive at the price needed to win. Buying Warner at $31-plus meant stacking content value against $59 billion of committed debt financing and a regulatory fight that had already drawn a DOJ second request in January — and then merging an ad-supported streamer with a cable-network bundle it never wanted.
Walking costs a breakup fee but preserves the balance sheet. Netflix keeps its leverage low and its strategy clean, and lets Paramount absorb the integration risk of 59 cable networks that come with the deal, per the agreement's structure reported in April Senate testimony.
What $110.9 Billion Actually Buys Paramount
The signed agreement ends the hostile theater: there is a contract now, not a tender. Paramount gets the Warner Bros. studio, HBO and the linear networks in one piece — the Discovery Global spin-off plan was abandoned when the sale process began. Paramount said on March 2, 2026 that Paramount+ and HBO Max will merge into a single service after closing, the first concrete answer to the perennial question of which streamer survives.
Winners: WBD shareholders, who get $31 cash; David Ellison, who converts a losing auction bid in December into a signed merger in February. Losers: Netflix, which spent three months and a breakup fee for nothing, and every rival streamer now facing a combined library of Warner, HBO and Paramount content under one roof.
For more context, read Paramount Launches $108 Billion All-Cash Tender Offer for Warner Bros..
For more context, read doj approves paramount warner bros merger.
For more context, read warner bros discovery shareholders approve paramount sale.