The separation between the streaming and television arms of entertainment giant Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) continues, as Warner revealed that CNN would no longer have a livestreaming function on HBO Max. The news did not sit well with shareholders, as Warner shares were down nearly 1.5% in the closing minutes of Friday’s trading.
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HBO Max has been home to live CNN programming for the last two years, reports note. That will no longer be the case starting November 17. This is in keeping with CNN’s plan to launch its own direct-to-consumer streaming offering, reports note, which is expected out later this fall. This is not the only loss that HBO Max will see as a result of the split, either; HBO Max will also lose much of its sports programming as well, a field Warner has been actively building up for some time now.
Interestingly, though, the break will not be clean. Several CNN originals will stay on HBO Max, including The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper and Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy. CNN’s executive vice president of digital products and services Alex MacCallum noted, “We learned from HBO Max’s large base of subscribers what people want and enjoy the most from CNN, and with the launch of our own new streaming subscription offering coming later this fall, we look forward to building off that and growing our audience with this unique, new offering.”
Gold Prices and Warner
Did you know there was a link between gold prices and Warner content? Strange but true! Longtime Discovery Channel buffs are no doubt aware of the show Gold Rush, which will be back for a new season November 7. The long-running series, which has had several spin-offs, is coming back for another season in an unusual environment: one with high gold prices.
In fact, reports note, by the time this season of Gold Rush is done, the various miners profiled in the series will pull out a combined total of nearly $100 million in gold. This is the largest total find in the series’ history. The various miners will face everything from soaring operating costs to internal mutiny among their crews in the process, however.
Is WBD Stock a Good Buy?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on WBD stock based on four Buys and 11 Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 147.3% rally in its share price over the past year, the average WBD price target of $16.19 per share implies 14.79% downside risk.
