dauman and mr.ams who again have been removed from the trust that oversees the stake in national amusements that in turn controls viacom and cbs, they are going to the court saying they want immediate judicial relief and a court ruling to invalidate the purported removal of them by mr. redstone as trustees of the trust and also invalidate the removal as well as directors of national amusements. they would assume then want him, that is mr. redstone, to be deemed potentially incompetent and not able to make decisions. and very harshly worded language, guys, that accompanies this lawsuit. in a press release i just received phillippe dauman says of shari redstone after years of -- she's inserted herself into her father's home. go onto say in fact she's recently repeatedly arranged viacom board members to meet with her, we've heard some of this language in the last 48 hours as well. mr. abrams, for his part says my soul purpose in joining this lawsuit is to allow the court to determine whether sumner red

, i take getting rid of dauman everyday.buy facebook, you have to live with zuckerberg, and if you buy viacom, you have to live with sumner here. it is not a corporate governance like here, and so we believe that there are many opportunities to catylize. >> have you talked to sumner? >> we have spoken to sherry, and we believe that the reins need to be taken off of him, and that would happen if dauman is out. >> and yahoo. >> and talking about the bad ceos all day here or what? >> well, still a shareholder? >> and yeah, for the same republican. bad ceo. and fundamental value here, and everybody is excited about the sale, but the more, i believe that the sale is going to be happening before the end of june, and the more exciting part of shareholders is what is coming after june, because that is when we will see what happens to the asian stakes, and the stakes are sitting out there, and something is going to be happening, and most investors believe it is going to happen, and could surprise on the tax side if they do something

of course. >> dauman was saying he was -- >> dauman gave a statement last fall where he he said he's as ever. now they're using the words against him. he's opinionated as ever and doesn't want dauman in the spot. how surreal. summer redstone is issuing statements against viacom. >> and dau march wman was consis guy. >> right. the smartest man i know. my friend, you know. it's out of character, which is what ddauman has been saying. what is -- >> but redstone hated dauman -- >> sherry. they've never gotten along. when dauman was named chairman as viacom. she abstained. she voted against him getting that post. what is brilliant about the maneuvering after the girlfriend testimony the judge said he knows what he wants, after that is when they made his move. if you think about it. if dauman is going to claim he's not in his right mind, he has to make a claim it happened very recently. because they were saying that, oh, he knows what he's doing. >> okay. a couple of interesting facts sherry lovesless -- >> she does. they get along great. >> end game. what does it look like? >> yeah. dare

dauman would claim by his daughter. he is 93 years old today is mr. redstone.ut, guys this is just one heck of a week. unprecedented really and kind of some of the things that i've seen and what is a pretty long career at this point. having the current and sitting chairman and ceo suing the daughter and in effect going against the wishes of his controlling shareholder. you don't see that every day. and, of course, it does leave viacom and potentially cbs in something of limbo right now as the two struggle to figure out just who is in charge? >> for viacom, that could be a good limbo. the viacom stock has done horribly. 35% decline. but even this past week alone it's up 13.5%. there must be thinking that this would shake up at least at the very least yield better management of the better company. >> absolutely. i think that is the key reason it's been up. the people i speak to do not expect in any way that shari redstone and/or mr. redstone would seek to sell the company. it is on the idea that new management will be installed. but for now, it has the infect of

liz: and they're on dauman's side mostly; correct? >> they are on dauman's side.e should point out again, mr. little hands, we were the first to report this news. so this is pretty big. as we said yesterday, mr. hands, the -- this could be coming any day. liz: and the stock, by the way, we should look at it, is jumping pretty decently here. but also some other unrelated news. viacom has renewed its carriage agreement with cox. cox cable. so the stock is up four and a quarter percent. >> well, the stock is not -- going up because of a board implosion -- a company implosion. which is what this is. this has a lot of investors scared. liz: yeah. >> and that's why this is, this thing is coming to an end imminently. it could be today as we reported. it could be tomorrow. liz: quick word on -- >> but i just want everybody. this could happen. you know, over the weekend as far as we know. liz: i bet they're meeting over the weekend. >> they are. they are. sherry is meeting with her people. we know that mr. hands. we know that s so sohmner is communicating. we know the boar

dauman and mr. abrams. back to the board fighting in a sense for mr. dauman, it's extraordinary.n if in fact the move is made to replace them and we end up in delaware court, it will be very interesting to see what is decided in that courthouse. of course other litigation already commenced in massachusetts to try to reinstate mr. abrams and mr. dauman on the trust. and much may come from here. but of course we're talking about two large companies. and that being cbs and viacom, and their fate seemingly on hold right now as one continues to try to negotiate a deal to sell a minority stake in the paramount studio, simon. >> seems never ending. >> well, it's just begun. just begun. >> this is true. in the meantime this morning's case shiller index shows house prices nationally gaining 5.2% over the past year, separately of course both new and existing home sales surging to their highest levels this year setting up the market for what would appear to be a strong spring selling season. we take a look at the home builders, the basket of stocks year-to-date badly lagging the broader mar

that dauman diverted resources from the continuing challenges facing the company. down about 40% in the past 12 months. now dauman wins the suit he filed today, he'd be reinstated as a trustee and redstone would be deemed incapacitated. dauman loses, sherry redstone can push him out as ceo of viacom. >> hard to keep track of the twists and tournz. turns. thank you. our next guest says the board room battles raises red flags but more concerning to him is the duel class stock structure which gives founders the large share of power and decision making. the stock is trading at $41 a share. good to you have with us, michael. from a shareholder perspective, what should shareholders be rooting for in term a possible turn around of a stock that is down 40% over the past year? >> in our opinion, the only path for shareholder appreciation at this spoint a change in management. current management team has been in place for ten years now. the shares have been consistent underperformers operationally an financially. and the share price reflects it. it's been a lagger relative t

dauman and mr. massachusetts, saying that it was a case in which a 93-year-old man's multibillion dollar businesses had been seized by an estranged daughter who has manipulated her father to achieve her goals. alleging undue influence in that change in trying to overturn it. that case will of course take quite some time to work its way through the probate courts of massachusetts. you then had a response from shari redstone and her father in the superior court of the state of california where they asked to confirm his move to have two assume their place on the trust as directors which they since have. and then to today in which i, again, those directors of viacom are at least preparing for the possibility that sumner redstone, who again controls 80% of the votes at viacom and at cbs, will call a meeting, essentially present his votes and say i am replacing these directors with new directors. if in fact that does occur, the directors at viacom who are prepared to go immediately in court in delaware se

it is really becoming a battle between sherry redstone and philippe dauman.nd cbss up around 4% is little changed here. hereeo here was removed from sumner redstone's trust. he is now suing to block that removal as it george abrams, another trustee. dauman has been a confidant of sumner redstone for years, but more recently, a rift has appeared between the two, perhaps fans by sherry redstone. if you look at how viacom shares ,ave performed under his tenure he basically took over as ceo back in september of 2006. shares are still up more than 9%. at one point in 2015, that game was much more. viacom is not alone in underperforming in media stocks. anthem and cigna are big during over there -- bickering over their upcoming deal. they are accusing each other of violating a merger agreement and fumbling submissions to regulators. both of those stocks are trading lower. shery: we are seeing shares of apple rallying today. what is going on there? julie: there is a report from the taipei-based economic daily that apple has asked suppliers to prepare production ipho

at the heart of the drama is felipe dauman who was born and raised in new york.couple of months ago was redstone's health care agent. shari now appears to be calling the shots as well as redstone's former companion. instead they have a simple question to ask. what the heck is going on with my money. joining us with some answers, ryan has a buy rating on the stock, a $50 price target. brian, great to have you with us. >> thank you for having me. >> you still like the stock? explain that. >> i didn't say i had the answers. i can look at the scenarios. >> what scenario should shareholders be rooting for? >> at some point in time, the business is either improved or gets sold. those are of the most likely outcomes. the reason this is toxic is you don't know how long you're going to have to wait. there is risk that in the meantime the company gets effectively burned to the ground. that's probably not going to happen. but that's a bit of a risk. now, i've been of the view that although i understand most of wall street is not a fan of dauman, that the company probably wo

dauman.question now i can tell you comes down to this, which is an expectation on the part of directors of viacom that they're going to be removed very soon by mr. redstone. now, when you look at the complaint that they filed yesterday in the probate court in norfolk, massachusetts, and you read it, of course they believe that mr. redstone is under the full control of his daughter shari, that he is not capable of making decisions any longer and that simply put she is basically taking a pen and writing his name on these decisions. she fully and completely rebuts that is the case and says without reservation that these are his decisions and there is a quote in the latest release announcing the changes of the trust. this is my trust and my decision. i have picked those who are loyal to me and removed those who are not. that is according to mr. redstone, a quote. and that is what much of this will come down to. but what i can tell you is that there is a concern on the part of -- or an expectation

and plus the granddaughter karen, and if there is time, also testimony from the viacom ceo philippe daumanvideotaped video. >> quite a day. and now, the markets are looking at the dow down 30 point, and shaving some losses, and the s&p is down 30%, and the nasdaq down half a percent after the nasdaq added lower than expected 160,000 jobs in april. and we will be joined by rick santelli and ed lazear in a moment. >>> twitter an square both having a rough month after disappointing quarter. square is on track for the worst day since going public down now close to 20%. jack dorsey joined kayla on the "closing bell" yesterday saying that he is trying to stay focused. take a listen. >> we focus on what matters and what matters is actually building the products and the service. again, we want to make sure that we are building something that people value every single day, and we are driving around building a daily you tutility t everyone can benefit from, and that is what we can control, and you know, we are showing it. we are focused and we have it prioritized and we know what comes next and what

with viacom shares down about 40% over the past 12 months, dauman's ceo job is at stake. if he wins this lawsuit, he can hold onto the ceo role. if he loses it, then sherry redstone's daughter could push him out. >> this goes back to the previous trial going on brought by manuel heurza calling into question redstone's mental capacity. the judge ended it after seeing the video. it didn't answer the question what mental state sumner redstone is in, did is it? >> that's right. the judge dismissed the suit. sumner redstone making it very clear with nasty names and expletives that he did not want him in his life anymore. the judge said he doesn't want her in his life and handling his medical affairs which is what heurzer wanted. we have seen the transcript of the testimony. it did raise a lot of questions about redstone's ability to communicate. he had a hard time expressing himself even with the help of someone who's effectively a translator. i think that's what really precipitated all of this. >> cbs in the cross hairs here, too. >> absolutely. >> it's interesting. julia, th

that being dauman to try to turn things around. i'm going to stand by my word. it's almost june. he's got another six months or so to do something but he better get something going soon. you are already halfway through the year. he hasn't done what i told them to do with paramount. maybe something amc-wise. >> taps that's the thing. it's not static. stasis is bad for these guys. they have been hemorrhaging talent with paramount and other properties under the viacom label. he has to make some sort of changes here. otherwise people like mario will give up. >> the reason for concern is because of the conversation is about management right now, not about the business model which has been in clearly decline over the last two to three years. april 28th, they report. look at the media network's advertising globally down i think 4%, dmoeomestically down . the real problem is the business model. that's the concern. that needs to be fixed. is that being done while all the attention is being shined elsewhere? >> the suggestions are being looked at to try to fix the miss in digital and sup t

the only thing that is not consistent is that sumner did not fire dauman earlier.ted confidant of sumner redstone and have helped him build this company from scratch for decades. from that perspective, investors are saying this is a shocking move that occurred over the weekend. i think investors are really questioning who made this move. was it in fact sumner? or is it his daughter, sherry, influencing sumner? that are some of the questions of the suits will try to answer. vonnie: the other question though is that dauman has not exactly been wonderful for the stock price. there would've been a case to maybe get rid of him anyway. paul: this is a media stock that has underperformed its big cap peers. the has traditionally been very weak ratings across many other cable networks they have acquired over the years and a lot of investment to try to drive those ratings. paramount is falling behind some of its other peers in hollywood. there's clearly an argument to be made and investors have made it by pushing the stock down that this management team has not performed wel

investors have not been happy with phillipe due dauman spending the money. they have tremendous content. nickelodeon, mtv, b.e.t., comedy central. viacom looks attractive and 3.6 dividend deal on company that generates a lot of cash. i think all the infight something real distraction for the stock. melissa: gary, it is definitely a distraction shun as people watch infighting. are they creating opportunity or distracting from a product falling apart? >> my problem is uncertainty is never good thing in either the markets or corporate america. a lot of people don't know who is actually running the show. sumner redstone i believe is the 3 years old. a lot of people are not sure whether he is making decisions or not -- 93 years old. as long as that continues the stock is dead money and that is all that has been going on. they have unbelievable properties but again, when you're dealing with markets sometimes even disney right now not acting too well. i think just be careful with it here. melissa: gary and john, thanks to both of you. david: we love those guys. mea

. >> philippe dauman is going to go down as the worst ceo of modern time. >> and the most important tradingof the day. >> i usually get to tweet about it, and now i'm on the show. it is one of the most exciting day days of my life. is >>> coming up on "power lunch" the ceo of the buyer tillman r fertitta, and oil hits $50, and we will also talk about 3% down on the home mortgages. are the banks back to the old ways? >> and jackie deangelis is back to phi mex -- to the nymex. >> yes, and many people will be traveling to get away, and millions of americans, and 38 million according to aaa are going to be hitting the road. and now, let me ask you about gasoline and what it is telling us about the energy complex, and is gasoline leading the crude higher? >> well, it is, jackie, and heading into the driving season, you can see the runup in gasoline, so it is not unexpected here, but what you are looking at here is a level that the gasoline has reached to make a nice run. we have the strikes going on in france that have cut the supply in terms of the refinery areas, but the demand picture has not

dauman, and we are going to fight you the minute you do that.eresting because loor a lot of behind the scenes stuff going on. independent board members want to meet with mr. redstone. okay? they want to meet with him for the simple reason to determine his competency at -- with -- liz: didn't a judge say he's competent? >> okay. so here's now what i understand. there is -- fred, the lead independent board member has gone to the redstones and said i want to talk to summer. i want to have a talk with him with another independent board member. they have said, the lawyer for mr. redstone said we will allow you to sit down but only if you submit your questions first. so this is turning into a real insane thing. listen, the board's position is simply this. mr. redstone is incompetent right now. he's not competent enough to remove redstone. and if sherry wants to remove it, she has to give us a corporate government's reason why because she's better than you. and if you do take that step of removing him and we will fight you in court and sue you in delaw

comes from redstone issue bd his spokesman who said he was considering ousting ceo chair philippe daumanrom the board. that move to control the shares if redstone is deemed incompetent or dies. shares of viacom have dropped about 50% in the last two years as its cable network suffer from viewers cutting the cord. the stock has risen more than 15% since redstone is removed from the trust. many believe redstone's daughter shari is behind the move. she's supports les moonves over at cbs. >> you don't cut the cord on things that they've got to have. spongebob suddenly isn't as important. >> it's constantly new content that comes through. comedy central with jon stewart. >> you know, it depends on espn, maybe advertising issues and down slightly. but comcast has been adding. >> comcast has been adding. >> i mean, this is an issue that people saw coming for a long time. it's an interesting chess game when you realize that there was just this battle to deem him incompetei incompetent in a different lawsuit. >> right. it's a classic -- >> when you come after me. >> it's a classic soap opera thin

dauman and he have filed suits. they've asked the judge to speed that up. >> their trustee seats. >> exactly. trying to get that trial under way as early as september. they're waiting to see if that will happen. >> exactly. these massachusetts courts, i'm told, moore very slowly, bill. meanwhile they may be faced with its entire board of directors having been ousted. now, as i have been reporting since tuesday, the board would immediately go to delaware and see seek relief there saying they had been removed incorrect incorrectly, but this is setting up a very difficult situation for viacom's management which is trying to sell a minority stake in paramount. you might understand if you're on the other side of that negotiating to buy a minority stake, you may be stepping back and saying, how do i know you're going to be around when i sign this deal. >> the trustee may be irrevocable but the trustee board seats may not. >> yes. >> thank you. >> thank you. >>> the s&p is outperforming the nasdaq. it's up half a percent a

wouldn't you nknow less moonvez and philippe dauman. >> two of the companies, disney andirius satelliteadio. even though it is 529 times or the ceo is paid 529 times more, they actually received a slight increase this year from 2014 for the average worker, although it was slight, 2%. >> everyone wants to be a media company. wasn't oreo wants to get in the game? now we know why. mary thompson. thank you. >>> the transport is up. the vicks up by a point and a half and the nasdaq is down only by about a point. >> we've gone 20 minutes and now we're going to talk about it. to hike or not to hike. up next, a former new york fed official will tell us why he thinks janet yellen should move in july, not in june. >>> plus, apple reportedly will start releasing a major iphone upgrade every three years now instead of every two. we'll discuss whether that's a smart move or a sign of trouble later on "closing bell." what are you doing right now? making a cake! ayla reminds me of like a master chef and emiana reminds me of like a monster chef. uh oh. i don't see cake, i just see mess. it's like awful

. >> last shot on viacom dauman, you want him to stay or go?i's decision. and she has 80% of the vote and that will work out. look, you want to buy merges, you want to be ahead of the game. we have three or four companies -- announced selling probably the rest of their african assets except tanzania, bought by malone, you have a convenience store business and then you have mergers in the energy business, oil and gas. so utilities, public service into mexico, el paso electric, everyone is consolidating in that business allowed to do that. so, you know, stay tuned in terms of broadcasting. stay tuned in terms of small regional banks. a lot more love making -- >> who's going to buy all the spectrum on monday? -- or tuesday rather. >> well, the spectrum on monday is being auctioned off -- the broadcasters have a reverse auction. and they're all buyers. >> have a great weekend. >> you too. enjoy nashville -- knoxville. >> that's it for us. make sure you join us on tuesday. it's time for "squawk on the street." ♪ >>> good friday morning. welcome to "

the chair recognizes the dauman from texas mr. gohmert for five minutes. >> thank you mr. chair. appreciate the witnesses being here today because this is important since the internal revenue service is the only entity of which i'm aware the federal government that can ignore the constitution as part of its job. nobody else ignores the constitution but they can take people's money without due process, they can take their property, they can move in and destroy take a business that they take a lifetime to build and they have done that so it is particularly important that such an agency they should ignore the constitution must itself be completely overwhelmed with integrity. .. bene >> until you get to the supervisors and above and that is where the rot is occurring and the stink is getting overwhelming. one of the judges in tyler texas, legislated from the bench and had an incredible sense of integrity and had he been listening to koskinen, he had no use for people that came in and obfuscated as this man has done. now, back under the bush administration, in this committee we had an