CBS News is denying a bombshell report which said the community was hemorrhaging around $50 million yearly — a claim the community aggressively shot down as “inaccurate.”
The controversy started on Wednesday when Puck correspondent Dylan Byers dropped a gorgeous merchandise claiming two sources acquainted with CBS News’ funds revealed the purported losses.
According to Byers, CBS News’ ailing steadiness sheet would not sit properly with its new boss, Skydance Media CEO David Ellison, whose company acquired company mother or father Paramount Global for $8 billion.
Ellison “certainly isn’t going to tolerate those losses,” Byers wrote in Puck.
CBS News is forcefully denying a Puck News report claiming the division is bleeding $50 million a yr. Bloomberg via Getty Images
“And despite his paeans to Walter Cronkite and the importance of a free press, he isn’t likely to invest in growing that business, either.”
But sources at CBS News instructed The Post that the Puck report was utterly off base.
“A published report that CBS News is losing ‘around $50 million a year’ is inaccurate,” a spokesperson for the division instructed The Post.
“In fact, the division is currently profitable.”
Puck correspondent Dylan Byers ignited a firestorm with his report on CBS News’ funds. Getty Images for SXSW
Industry insiders immediately seized on Byers’ scoop as a signal that the new management workforce helming CBS News would embark on a cost-cutting spree, according to the Status publication.
On Friday, The Post completely reported that Skydance is making ready to enact a huge “bloodbath” of layoffs across Paramount in November
A $50 million annual loss would nearly guarantee brutal finances slashing at CBS News, which issued a denial less than 24 hours after Puck printed its story.
Unnamed community workers instructed Status that they suspect the bogus $50 million determine was intentionally planed with Byers in order to justify impending cuts.
Skydance Media CEO David Ellison, who now oversees Paramount and CBS News, is said to be eyeing main value cuts. AFP via Getty Images
Byers refused to retreat from his bombshell report. After posting CBS’s denial on social media, he doubled down with cryptic warnings about accounting “nuances that deserve further exploration.”
“60 Minutes” stays profitable, Byers famous, but “the rest is… complicated.” He promised to deal with the controversy in his next publication.
The Post has sought remark from Puck and Byers.
Byers reported that Ellison’s plan “is to right-size CBS News, bring down talent salaries, require smaller teams to work on smaller budgets, maybe leverage evergreen ’60 Minutes’ packages on Paramount+, and hopefully lure Bari Weiss into the mix to shake things up a bit.”
It’s been reported that Weiss, a former opinion editor for the New York Times, has been buying her information web site, The Free Press, for up to $250 million.
Newly put in Paramount President Jeff Shell has also reportedly been speaking up potential cost-cutting measures at CBS News. REUTERS
According to Byers, Weiss, who has reportedly held discussions with Ellison about promoting The Free Press, may be on her method to the Tiffany Network to take up a senior post at the information division.
“As of this week, the new Paramount front office remains bullish on the Bari deal,” according to the Puck correspondent.
The timing of Byers’ merchandise couldn’t have been worse for the embattled community, which is already reeling from company mother or father Paramount’s choice to axe “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” in gentle of reports the late-night program was bleeding $40 million yearly.
Both the struggling show and information division fall under the purview of Paramount govt George Cheeks, probably placing him at the helm of almost $90 million in mixed annual losses if both figures proved correct.
The new management workforce in charge of Paramount is said to be eager on bringing in Bari Weiss. Getty Images for Uber, X and The Free Press
Jeff Shell, the newly put in president of Paramount, has been telling colleagues that cost-cutting ranks among his prime priorities as Ellison’s lieutenant.
Last week, Shell, The former NBC Universal govt, said he expects $2 billion in cuts in one fell swoop.
“We do not want to be a company that has layoffs every quarter,” Shell said last Wednesday in Los Angeles, citing fixed waves of cuts under Paramount’s earlier management.
“So, it’s going to be painful. It’s always hard, but we don’t want to be a company that every quarter is laying people off. It is important for us to get done what we’re doing in one big thing and then be done with it.”