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Paramount, Comcast and Netflix are preparing bids to buy all or part of Warner Bros. Discovery, a crown jewel of the industry.

Warner Bros. Discovery, the media giant that owns HBO, CNN and the Warner Bros. movie studio, has been sold and renamed three times since the turn of the century. Here comes the fourth.

The company announced plans to consider a sale last month, and the deadline for initial bids is Thursday. Three heavyweights — Netflix, Comcast and Paramount — are expected to pursue all or part of the company to cement their primacy in Hollywood.

Each of the three companies is preparing arguments for why it is the best option, according to several people with knowledge of their plans. And the arguments are not just about money (though a lot of them are about money). They are also about politics. The deal, like all major mergers and acquisitions, will need approval from federal enforcers, and President Trump has often made clear his preferences for media ownership.

So the bidders will need to make a persuasive case to Warner Bros. Discovery’s board of directors that they can navigate the financial and regulatory hurdles. Here is the situation facing the three of them:

Paramount: Deep Pockets and Ties to Trump

Paramount, the conglomerate behind CBS News, films like “Top Gun” and fading cable networks like MTV, is widely viewed as the front-runner in the bidding contest. And that is because of its financial and political advantages.

The older Mr. Ellison is also a longtime supporter of Mr. Trump. The Trump administration blessed the Ellison family’s takeover of Paramount, and the president has praised the younger Mr. Ellison in briefings with reporters.

But the new mogul has not yet convinced the board of Warner Bros. Discovery that Paramount’s approach would be best for shareholders. David Zaslav, the company’s chief executive, will be a power broker with board members as they weigh offers, not least because of his relationships with influential shareholders like John Malone. Paramount has offered Mr. Zaslav a role as co-chief executive of the combined company, giving him a seat at the table in any potential deal. Mr. Ellison wants to buy all of Warner Bros. Discovery, including traditional cable channels like TNT, saying it would give shareholders the most lucrative way to cash out.

Competitors and possibly consumer groups are also likely to raise concerns with regulators about any Paramount deal, because shared ownership of Warner Bros. and Paramount Pictures would strengthen the movie studios’ hand at the struggling box office. The combined company would also own a huge group of cable networks as well as overlapping businesses in Europe, where regulators must also approve any deal.

Paramount has privately resolved to keep the movie studios separate, and has argued that media companies need to be larger to compete with deep-pocketed technology giants like Amazon and Google. In a letter to the board of Warner Bros. Discovery, Mr. Ellison argued that a deal between the two would be good for the industry, “creating a more robust streaming platform to compete with the dominant tech giants and larger media players.”

Comcast: An Open Role for Zaslav?

Comcast, the cable and wireless giant that owns NBC, the Universal movie studio and lucrative theme parks, is taking a different approach.

Comcast wants only Paramount’s studio and streaming service, in an effort to supercharge its own businesses, a person with knowledge of discussions inside the company said. That would avoid regulatory scrutiny of a concentrated ownership of cable networks. (Like Paramount, though, Comcast would need to contend with questions stemming from its ownership of two major movie studios.)

Comcast has at least one other carrot for Mr. Zaslav: It could offer him a major role overseeing its media business, because NBCUniversal hasn’t had a dedicated media chief executive since 2023. Brian Roberts, the chairman and co-chief executive of Comcast, shares a mentor with Mr. Zaslav in Mr. Malone.

But Comcast has roughly $99 billion in debt, reducing its ability to make a lucrative cash offer to compete with Paramount. (Comcast has abundant free cash flow and is in good standing with its ratings agencies, meaning it could take on additional debt at favorable terms for a bid.)

And Mr. Trump has a well-known grudge against Mr. Roberts, whom he has called a “disgrace to the integrity of broadcasting.” Still, the company has joined many others in trying to cultivate a relationship with the president in his second term; Comcast recently donated millions to help fund the construction of a ballroom at the White House.

Netflix: Plenty of Money and Motivation

Netflix, the king of the entertainment industry, is also focused on buying only Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming service and studio, a person with knowledge of discussions inside the company said. And with a market value of about $470 billion, it has plenty of money at its disposal.

Buying Warner Bros. Discovery’s studio and streaming businesses could further distance Netflix from competitors like Disney and Paramount. The deal would come with intellectual property, including characters like Batman and Harry Potter, that is a potential gold mine for Netflix. The Warner Bros. studio lot in Burbank, Calif., could also be valuable.

But all of that may raise red flags with government antimonopoly enforcers. Some lawmakers have already criticized a potential deal over antitrust concerns. Representative Darrell Issa, a Republican from Southern California, sent a letter last week to Pam Bondi, the attorney general, raising concerns about the potential combination.

In the letter, Mr. Issa wrote that combining Netflix’s “300 million global subscribers” with “HBO Max’s subscribers and Warner Bros.’ premier content rights” would push the entity to “above a 30 percent share of the streaming market: a threshold traditionally viewed as presumptively problematic under antitrust law.”

But Netflix may argue that the company is dwarfed by tech companies like Google, whose YouTube has leapfrogged its rivals to become one of the most popular streaming services.

Netflix may also argue that it poses a reduced antitrust risk because it does not already own one of the major Hollywood studios. Netflix and HBO Max, the Warner Bros. streaming service, already have significant overlap, and Netflix could argue that combining the two services would give customers more bang for their buck.

Recent oil and gas deals in Europe suggest that the growing demand for energy may be leading companies to adopt a more pragmatic approach.

TotalEnergies, the French energy giant, said on Monday that it would spend 5.1 billion euros (about $5.9 billion) to acquire a 50 percent interest in mostly natural-gas-fired power plants in several European countries, the latest move by an energy company to return to the once-shunned fossil fuel business.

The company, which is already a sizable investor in electric power, said it would use the gas plants to help balance its portfolio of electricity production from renewable sources like wind and solar farms.

The facilities, which are owned by EPH, an energy company controlled by the Czech industrialist Daniel Kretinsky, are in Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Ireland and France.

The move appears to be a sign of an increasingly pragmatic approach to energy and climate change by companies, even in Europe, which has been more aggressive pursuing environmental goals than the United States.

The world has changed since the Paris agreement was adopted decade ago with ambitious goals to tackle climate change. It has become increasingly apparent that the agreement’s targets to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions will not be met, and not just because the Trump administration has pulled out of the Paris process.

Energy companies have taken note. “They’ve certainly abandoned the idea that they can lead the world along that kind of pathway,” said Luke Parker, vice president for corporate research at the energy consultant Wood Mackenzie, referring to the Paris agreement.

Analysts say Europe is unlikely to copy the major shifts in energy policy occurring in the United States, but course corrections are likely.

Even Germany, which has long prided itself on being a leader in renewable energy, is building gas-powered generation plants capable of generating 10 gigawatts, a substantial amount.

Some Europeans may resent Washington’s hostility toward efforts to tackle climate change, but the Trump administration’s approach may be influencing European governments to be more receptive to the oil and gas industry and its products.

Exxon Mobil, for instance, recently signed in Athens what some in the industry consider a breakthrough in a preliminary agreement to explore for oil and gas in Greek waters. Trump administration officials, including the energy secretary, Chris Wright, were in attendance.

“The U.S. is proud to partner with Greece as we restore common sense and unleash affordable, reliable and secure energy,” Mr. Wright wrote on social media.

Changes in policy matter, but the shift is also guided by the practical lessons that companies, governments and societies have learned about the difficulties in shifting from a world that runs on fossil fuels to something else.

TotalEnergies has been a large scale developer of solar and wind energy. Over time, though, the company’s executives have concluded that just building solar and wind farms is not a very profitable exercise.

These facilities alone are not sufficient for meeting the growing demand for what the company calls “clean, firm” power from customers like data centers.

Because solar and wind depend on sunshine and breeze, a steadier means of generating electricity is needed, and in many European countries, natural gas fills the bill. “It’s more or less a system that will be 50-50, you know, at the end between gas and renewables,” Patrick Pouyanné, TotalEnergies’ chief executive, told analysts on Monday, describing where his company was heading in Europe.

Mr. Pouyanné noted that the new plants would complement TotalEnergies’ position as one of the largest suppliers to Europe of liquefied natural gas, a chilled fuel transported by ship.

Shell, Europe’s largest energy company, has taken a tougher approach toward renewables on the basis that investment in some of these technologies will not be sufficiently profitable.

The company, which is based in London, said recently that it would pull out of efforts to develop two floating wind farms in British waters and an offshore wind venture called Atlantic Shores in the United States. Shell said it wanted to focus on trading electricity.

Other companies are also seeing a changing energy landscape. The war in Ukraine led to a sharp reduction in natural gas supplies from Russia and increasing dependence on the United States, nudging Europe to nurture its own production, according to some energy executives.

As chief executive of Energean, an oil and gas producer with interests in offshore fields around Europe, Mathios Rigas is well placed to pick up on changes in the region’s approach to energy.

Energean was a key participant in the deal with Exxon to drill in the waters off Greece, a country heavily dependent on imported fuel.

Italy, where Energean holds stakes in three fields, is easing some restrictions on drilling and considering legislation that may fast-track natural gas projects to feed industry.

Mr. Rigas said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continued to influence the thinking of European governments toward fossil fuels.

“We went through a phase where Italy did not want to give permits,” he said. “Now I think they’re starting to shift, and they’re starting to understand that they need local hydrocarbon production,” he said, referring to oil and gas.

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Activist investor encouraged by idea that the miner could split into two companies under new boss

Activist hedge fund Elliott Management has built a large stake in Barrick Mining, according to people familiar with the matter, after the world’s second-largest gold producer struggled to capitalise on a blistering bullion rally.

Elliott’s investment comes as the Toronto-based miner has pledged to refocus on its lucrative North American business after the sudden departure of its chief executive Mark Bristow in September, adding to speculation that the company could be planning a break-up or asset sales.

Elliott’s stake puts it among Barrick’s 10 largest investors, the people said. That would mean the hedge fund’s holding is worth at least $700mn (C$1bn).

As bullion has soared to record highs in recent months, boosting gold miners’ valuations, Barrick’s share price performance has lagged rivals and the company has faced a series of setbacks, including losing control of a key mine in Mali.

However, the people said Elliott was encouraged by the idea that Barrick could split into two companies, separating its higher-growth North American operations from its mines in riskier regions across Asia and Africa.

Barrick’s board, led by chair John Thornton, recently discussed separating the two parts of the business, as well as outright sales of its African and Pakistan assets, Reuters reported last week.

This would in effect unravel the modern-day Barrick that was created in 2019 in an all-stock acquisition by Randgold.

The exact size of Elliott’s stake could not immediately be established, nor could its precise demands of the mining company. Elliott and Barrick declined to comment.

Bristow, a swashbuckling South African executive who took Randgold public in 1997, departed ahead of schedule in September after facing criticism for repeatedly failing to meet production and cost targets.

During his tenure, Bristow masterminded the development of the $9bn Reko Diq copper-gold mine in Pakistan, which stands to be one of the world’s largest copper mines once complete.

But shareholders have raised concerns about the project and the risks of operating in Balochistan province, which is home to a violent separatist movement.

The market value of Barrick, which has its primary listing in Toronto and secondary listing in New York, was $62.5bn at market close on Monday, more than double its valuation a year ago.

But its shares are up less than 55 per cent over the past five years, compared with 232 per cent and 144 per cent gains for rivals Kinross Gold and Agnico Eagle respectively.

With $76.1bn of assets under management, Elliott is regarded on Wall Street as the most formidable activist investor, having unveiled multibillion-dollar positions in household names such as Pepsi, BP and Honeywell over the past year.

The Florida-based firm, founded by Paul Singer, is well acquainted with the mining sector, as it holds a sizeable stake in Anglo American, which recently agreed to merge with rival Teck Resources. Elliott also previously targeted Kinross, leading it to boost its share buyback programme.

Barrick’s stock has been propelled to 13-year highs in recent months by a huge gold find at its Fourmile project in Nevada, which studies indicate has the potential to yield as much as 750,000 ounces of gold a year. The company says it is one of the biggest discoveries of the precious metal this century.

Barrick’s North American operations also span a host of other prized gold mines in Nevada through a joint venture with Newmont, as well as mines in Dominican Republic.

Barrick also operates copper and gold mines in higher-risk territories from the Democratic Republic of Congo to Papua New Guinea, largely a legacy of the former Randgold business.

In his first public appearance since replacing Bristow as chief executive on an interim basis, Barrick veteran Mark Hill said this month he saw “a big opportunity” in focusing more on the North American business, particularly Nevada, calling it the “next big growth area”.

Hill said the company was focused on improving operational performance and value creation.