Paramount Skydance has been appealing to activist investors to help with its Netflix battle

Paramount Skydance’s bankers have been looking for activist investors to help boost sales for Warner Bros. Discovery for its studio and streaming service on Netflix, On The Money has learned.

One emerged Wednesday when Ancora Holdings announced it had taken a small stake — just $200 million in a company with a market cap of nearly $70 billion — as it tried to persuade WBD’s board to reconsider its decision to accept Netflix’s $27.75 bid for pieces of the company instead of Paramount Skydance’s offer to buy the rest.

The question is whether this is enough to help move the rest of WBD’s investor class to join its effort to boost Netflix’s offering, or there are some signs of a possibility.

Ancora thinks so. “The currently proposed Netflix-WBD deal asks shareholders to accept a low price, gamble on an uncertain spinoff and risk a lot of control – despite the availability of a high price and a certain $30 per share from Paramount,” Ancora said on its website.

An Ancora spokesperson tells On The Money that the fund “made a completely independent decision to invest in Warner Brothers based on the opinion, analysis and application of the investment team … Ancora was not contacted by any Warner Brothers solicitor.

But Ancora’s announcement came after reps of Paramount Skydance, known on Wall Street as PSKY, have been raking in activist funds since late December to join their sinister bid to wrest the property from Netflix.

One big activist investor told On The Money that he had received “a number of calls from bankers involved in this matter to participate” and vote against the deal, where shareholders are expected to approve the purchase of Netflix later this month or early next season.

This activist, who asked not to be named, said that he decided not to take the position because of the difficulty of growing activist games in media companies like WBD, where the management is heavily supported by big investors.

Another issue: The timing of WBD’s shareholder vote to sell it to Netflix makes it more difficult to elect new directors early to prevent a sale.

A spokesperson for Paramount Skydance had no comment.

At least for now PSKY needs to work hard to change the hearts and minds of WBD investors about Netflix – even if it has strong arguments for why they should think twice. Shareholders bought just a fraction of the 2.6 billion shares left in the sale, and that’s on the back of recent and significant developments in their favor.

Negotiations are ongoing; and many investors are said to be sympathetic to PSKY’s argument that it offers a clean deal, both from a regulatory and financial perspective as Netflix’s valuation is heavily dependent on the uncertainty of the WBD cable properties’ output. On The Money has learned that Pentwater Capital Management, a major WBD investor with over $100 billion in assets under management, has officially joined Paramount Skydance’s efforts and will back its aggressive bid; could get a board seat if PSKY eventually wins, said a person close to the media company.

PSKY, on the other hand, recently entertained its offer, albeit slowly, to cash in a $2.8 billion breakup fee if the Netflix deal is rejected by WBD and other minors. The best for your cause is what comes out of the DOJ antitrust, which should approve the Netflix deal and has some serious doubts given its No. 1 broadcast. 1 and No. 3 broadcast on HBO Max, and whether that’s the start of a monopoly on how Americans watch their entertainment.

As The Post reported, due to all of the above Warner Bros. Acquisitions may have no choice but to seriously consider Paramount Skydance’s latest lucrative offer to drive its megadeal with Netflix, especially if PSKY raises its bid as many think it will.

Netflix reckons the update is normal, but people inside the Trump administration say it’s worse. However, barring PSKY’s move to increase its offer to around $33 a share – a move that would force the WBD board to reopen the bidding process – the deal appears to be close to winning Netflix a shareholder vote and owning the company.

That is, unless investors wake up and realize that the government might say “no,” or PSKY throws in more money.