David Zaslav Cashes In: WBD CEO Scores Massive Merger Windfall

David Zaslav, ex-CEO of the former Warner Bros. Discovery saw a windfall of just over $600 million as he handed over his WBD shares to Paramount at $31 each.

An SEC filing today shows the Oct. 6 exchange of tranches of common stock and options as Paramount closed its acquisition of WBD and changed its name to Skydance. The merger, unveiled in February and valued at $110 billion, called for Paramount to acquire all of WBD’s outstanding shares at $31. Zaslav’s stock options vested immediately as the deal closed.

Executives and board members of WBD are required to register the stock sales and the numbers are high. Zaslav and the Warner board drove a hard bargain, rejecting series of takeover offers by David Ellison that started at $18 a share in cash with the offer propelled ever higher by a determined Paramount CEO David Ellison.

Paramount offered other sweeteners as well, including a so-called ticking fee of about $7 million a day to be distributed to WBD shareholders and kicking in Oct. 1 if the deal hadn’t closed (Paramount had to pay through Oct. 6) and Larry Ellison backstopping all of the equity financing.

Zaslav has long been among the highest paid CEOs in media, and some years across all sectors. His package also includes a $34.2 million cash bonus, $44.2 million in perquisites, and a unspecified amount for a tax reimbursement. The cash for WBD equity payment reported today is higher than around $517 million initially anticipated.

A spokesman for the company noted that Zaslav had doubled the number of WBD employees who held equity in merged Discovery and Warner Media to about half of the total workforce, so they’re also benefitting from the Paramount takeover.