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Ever since the rumours started circulating that Disney were about to start an approach to buy out Hasbro Inc traders have been scrambling for Hasbro stock which lead to Wall Street analysts taking a closer look into the possible deal between these two giants. This has led to an article being published in the Providence Journal by John Kostrzewa in which he states that:
"Hasbro declined comment, citing its policy of not talking about rumor or speculation. CNBC analyst David Faber reported that Hasbro's advisors told him there's "absolutely nothing going on that they are aware of at all, in any way, shape or form" involving Hasbro or Disney."
So advisors to Hasbro, tell a DNBC analyst "nothing to it", which leads John to directly ask Hasbro Inc who decline to comment. What does this mean? Well it's an "unofficial no" and not an official statement, though Hasbro will always decline to comment as they will not want to be seen as being negative just incase Disney are working out a offer.
This story is expected to continue to run
MTV Geek are reporting rumour that having recently bought LucasFilm to add to their portfolio including Marvel and Pixar, that Disney are in talks to aquire Hasbro Inc. MTV Geek claim to have been told that "these are still just discussions at this point, but serious enough that something could be announced at any time and create ripples throughout the entertainment industry. The Lucasfilm acquisition has been reported as taking as few as 6 months to complete. On the other hand, Disney Chairman and CEO Bob Iger has until 2015 on his current contract, and he waited about 3 years in between the acquisitions of Marvel and Lucasfilm, so we may be without firm news on this for some time."
If this rumour does turn out to be true it's affects will be far reaching indeed as it is likely to signal the end of both The Hub (A Hasbro - Discovery joint venture) as well as the relationship between Hasbro and Paramount for the live-action franchise for both Transformers and G.I-Joe, when the current agreements expire. Remember, Paramount had the Iron Man rights originally.
SlashFilm has joined in on the discussion and agrees with us regarding this pointing out that "If the deal follows the LucasFilm model, those rights [the live action movies for Transformers and G.I. Joe] would likely stay with that company, at least until some kind of contract runs out.". The also make mention to the fact that Universal had controlling rights to a collection of Hasbro Inc properties including Clue (Cludeo), Ouija, Stretch Armstrong and Battleship, but famously dropped most of them and only released Battleship. Wirth Disney owning their own studios, this would no longer be an issue for Hasbro, Disney could just churn out movies of all of their IPs at will.
Hasbro Inc stock has also seen a recent rise.
Stay tuned as there is likely to be much more on this story over the coming days, weeks and months
Yesterday it was announced that Disney have purchased Marvel Entertainment for $4 billion. What does this have to do with Transformers, you may ask. Well both companies already have deals with Hasbro or Takara for cross branded figures. It may also affect the direction of the next cartoon series of Transformers by throwing a spanner in the works of Hasbro Inc.'s joint venture with Discovery Communications to create a TV network. According to Wells Fargo analyst Tim Conder, Hasbro recently extended its contract with Marvel until 2017. &quto;We do not view this transaction as having any material negative implications from this perspective," he wrote. The Associate Press speculate that the decision might affect Hasbro and Discovery's TV network joint venture, since it makes it less likely the network will offer shows centered around Marvel characters.
Now, "it is highly likely that Disney will want to retain Marvel-related programming content for its own channels of distribution," Conder noted.
He kept his "Outperform" rating on the Pawtucket, R.I., company's stock. Shares of Hasbro fell 12 cents to $28.21 during morning trading.