National Amusements Requests Viacom, CBS To Consider Potential Combination

(RTTNews) - Viacom Inc. (VIAB, VIA) announced its board has received a letter from National Amusements requesting that it explore a potential combination of Viacom and CBS (CBS-A, CBS). National Amusements, directly and through subsidiaries, owns approximately 80% of the voting shares of both Viacom and CBS and approximately 10% of Viacom's total common stock outstanding.

National Amusements said it is not willing to accept or support any acquisition of Viacom by a third party or any transaction that would result in National Amusements surrendering its controlling position in Viacom.

"Our tentative view is that the optimal structure would be an all-stock transaction in which the stockholders of each company would receive shares in the combined company of the same class as they currently hold," National Amusements stated.