The sale of Warner Bros. Discovery took on a more definitive shape when Netflix revised its proposal and announced it would pay entirely in cash for the acquisition of the studios, HBO, HBO Max, and the games division. The price tag has not changed, roughly $83 billion, but the gesture changes everything. By removing the component tied to its own stock, Netflix delivers predictability to shareholders and neutralizes the main vulnerability that rivals had been exploiting.

The move is a direct response to the persistent attempt by Paramount Global to take over Warner through a hostile bid. For weeks, Paramount’s argument rested on the security of an all-cash offer. By matching that criterion, Netflix drains the rival’s core talking point and shifts the pressure back. The dispute stops being about structure and becomes about confidence in the business model that will sustain the asset over the long term.

This sale was never about Warner in its entirety. The deal предусматриes the separation of the linear TV arm, including channels like CNN and TNT, which will continue as an independent company with its own debt. Netflix is buying only what it sees as central to the future of entertainment: production, IP, and streaming. It is a surgical and symbolic decision. The past stays on one side. The future moves to the other.

For Warner shareholders, the new format simplifies the choice. The per-share value is clear, market risk is reduced, and the timetable accelerates, with a vote expected as early as 2026. For Paramount, the message is just as clear. If it wants to stay in the race, it will need to offer more than a check because the narrative of financial security is no longer exclusive.

In the background, the sale lays bare Hollywood’s structural transformation. A century-old studio changes hands not out of nostalgia or tradition, but because of logic rooted in flow, scale, and predictability. Netflix is not promising to preserve what Warner once was. It is promising to integrate what Warner can still become within a global model of continuous production.

The sale of Warner, then, is not just a multibillion-dollar transaction. It is a marker. It crystallizes who is setting the rules at this moment in the industry and who is chasing them. And by opting for cash, Netflix makes clear that it is not merely taking part in Hollywood’s history. It is writing the next chapter.