alex sherman's with me now from new york. rst of all, do we have any indication whatsoever that verizon could actually pull out of this deal? >> not yet. we don't have any evidence at this stage that verizon wants out. it sort of behooves verizon to take this stance whether or not they won out. -- whether or not they want out. at this stage, all of the leverage in this deal swings verizon's way. there's no downside to saying there may be an adverse material affect to the hacking because the worst thing that can happen is verizon gets no discount. what they are hoping for is a discount on the deal announced several months ago. at the extreme, they would pull out of the deal entirely, but there is no real evidence yet that verizon wants to walk away. emily: the investigation is ongoing, and verizon says it has gotten little information and wants more. what is it that verizon wants and needs to know? alex: they are going to have to figure out how material this is. this becomes a legal issue quickly. it will be turned over to the

alex sherman broke the story with bloomberg news. tion -- alex, what is the next thing for these ceo's? they have to go out and sell it. the reality, alex sherman, is i have not seen a constructive research note yet. what are they going to say next? alex: here is what i think is coming. this transaction signals -- and i have not seen this either. this is my own guesswork. critique ofmning what is called "tv everywhere." it is lingo in the industry in the last seven years for getting tv on all your devices. provider,able from my i get the video on all my mobile devices, etc. the same video. we have not seen that today. you still can't do that, 6, 7 years after the invention of everywhere." i think at&t is going to make the case by buying time warner, they can accelerate the pace where we can actually get video on all our devices if i buy it directly from my provider. in this case, at&t. they can do this by owning time warner. since they basically have this big chunk of content, they can forcibly say, we can give you all this because we

alex sherman helped to break the story and joins us from our san francisco office. along in these talks? alex: pretty early. no banks have been hired yet. so chalk this up to senior executives talking to figure out the art of the possible here. i think things have been discussed, if it is not a full on acquisition, which would be a very large deal, although for at&t standards certainly not something that would be seen as too large. they bought directv not too long ago, and this is in the same general ballpark as directv. but there are two options here. one of them is a full on acquisition. scarlet: what changed for jeff dicus? rupert murdoch made overtures two years ago, and he did not want to be taken over by that company. he wanted to remain independent. he was steadfast in that. what has changed his mind? alex: part of it might be whatever price is being offered. there might be a chasm that stops this. public wethe ceo of a traded company. the previous offer was $85 a share, and before our story time warner was trading at $85 a share. that might be one reason. an

now joining us is bloomberg's alex sherman.nesses. -- businessman. is it no coincidence that he is a seller now? >> if you follow rich greenfield, he talked about this for years. i'm not saying he's wrong. to some degree the evidence is right there. the ratings for these cable networks consistently go down. the general trajectory is down much across the board. there is clearly pressure from hulu to getand content elsewhere from cheaper. time warner is a legacy media company to some degree. this was a great offer price, way higher than the $85 per share offer. this is even beyond that. shareholders should to some degree say he did up the evidence in front of us. >> if at&t were here they would say wait a second, that's true for the turner, but this is got hpo and warner and those things are really valuable -- hbo and warner and those are valuable. >> i think we all believe that for a long time now and it feels is the next leg of that trade of the media consolidation. david: to be fair i do see this from both sides. at&t also bou

what we understand from alex sherman and ian king of bloomberg news is a difference of 10%.ture of the deal is quite different. an xp, of course, would like all cash -- nxp, of course, would like all cash. qualcomm would like to use some stock as well. qualcomm has loads of cash. they could use that to acquire nxp, which is based in the netherlands. there is some advantage to that. nxp once more cash. qualcomm wants to use some stock. it's more important for the markets how these different segments represent the way technology is coming together. david: you mentioned the consolidation in this space. we've seen record deals in this space already recently. cory: we've certainly seen some giant ones. i think what's curious about this one in particular is it really talks about market and it talks about this convergence between mobile phones and automotive. mobile phones and automotive have been a focus for nxp, which brought us the chip that gives us a google wallet or a samsung wallet or apple pay. in every smart phone that has these, every terminal that has the readers that ca

you to give us some context is jeff mccracken and alex sherman. this, reading the stories about this, it was hatched in various stages. it did seem to move rather quickly. what is the timing? >> part of it was that at&t could get this done without being interrupted. there were only about eight people involved in the deals, from our understanding. depending on who you believe, they were planning on announcing this deal monday. we broke the story on thursday. it had gotten all the way almost until the end until we came up with the news. of it is simple to make sure nobody comes in by time warner other than at&t. whether that is google or apple or comcast, who else may be interested, at&t wanted to get it locked up, and then it would make it more difficult to come over the top because you would then have to involve breakup fees. the other part of it, at&t wants to be bold. they bought directv. they have been bolder than verizon, who bought aol. big bet fromecond at&t to get in front of this new mobile video world. tell usjeff mccracken, about randall

joining us for the latest on both stories, alex sherman in new york. alex, let's start with twitter. there's reporting now that google and disney are not making a bid for twitter. that sells far -- sales force may be the only suitor remaining. what do we know? alex: it's not all that surprising that google at this stage would say they're not bidding. our initial reporting indicated they might not bid. it opportunity make sense, i would arguing for google to bid unless it knows someone else is going to to a deal for twitter. i think google is fine with an independent twitter. they have a search partnership there. you would think the reason they'd want to buy twitter is to secure that search partnership for the long haul. if they felt like twitter would be an independent company there'd there'd be no need to buy twit . disney, they were with a financial advisor last week. we haven't been able to independently confirm they're out of this yet so we don't know that for sure yet. rico did say they're not going to bid. sales force is still there. sales force h

vonnie: alex sherman, thanks for that. mark: stocks moving in the early u.s. session today. $6.4 billion. this is bloomberg. ♪ mark: live from london and new york, i am mark barton. vonnie: and i am vonnie quinn. you are watching "bloomberg markets." time for the biggest stories in the news right now. shares of syngenta ag falling in europe on concerns that a $43 billion takeover is in jeopardy. the chinese company missed a deadline to make concessions. is based in switzerland and produces herbicides and pesticides. goldman sachs has cut s&p 500 earnings estimates through 2018. the chief equity strategist be upst that profits will 5% this year, 10% next year, 5% in 2018. he says low interest rates and peaking margins will hold down growth in infotech, financials, and telecoms. royal phillips posted third-quarter profits that rose 13%. the calmness as business improved and it's personal health businesses. -- the company says business has approved at its personal health businesses. we will be speaking with the ceo later on. that is your bloomberg business flash.

for more, let's bring in our m&a reporter alex sherman. who is left?rested, reported that apple is not interested, and disney is not as well. does that leave stills force -- salesforce? still in it, as of now. i have not been able to confirm disney is out. google is an interesting case because they do not really need to buy twitter on its own in order to keep its current search partnership intact. the strategy for google may be to buy twitter now so that we can keep this search tied forever. but if no one were to buy twitter, you could see to tediously google also not needing to buy twitter. prisoners bit of dilemma game theory going on. it would make sense for google to say we are not going to bid at this time, which is what recode reported. we know that google is working with lazard. my sources tell me that there was never a firm commitment from google that they were going to bed, so it is possible they do not here and they are just looking at twitter and kicking the tires, and moving on. bidders, and if it comes off by this pace? right now it is wor

oliver: alex sherman, king of the green bay. scarlet: oh right, on bloomberg exclusive. a look at some of the bloomberg business flash. viennawill join talks in about potential corporation. an, and i surest by sean have already assured for his vision. exxon mobil has discovered up to one million barrels of oil off the shores of nigeria. the company owns 27% of the site. other partners include chevron and a chinese company. the news comes before exxon mobil announces third-quarter results. contributed tos higher than expected profit last quarter. the company sees strong sales growth continuing even after setback in trading lung cancer patients. onstol-myers focused oncology in the face of experiments. oliver: still ahead is options insight. stocks on this for its biggest gain in weeks after reports from the close today. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪ optioning me for today's is senior market strategist at trading advantage from the cboe in chicago. we have been talking about how volatility has fallen off. we have seen the futures curve come in, currency volatility fall -- when do

peabody: to convince alex trebek that the world adores him more with facial hair, sherman and i set the wabac to 1984, culver city, "jeopardy!" studios, for alex to try... the trebek! been there, done that. [ laughter ] this is "jeopardy!" let's meet today's contestants -- an internal-medicine resident from toronto, ontario, canada... a cellar hand from los angeles, california... and our returning champion,