Sumner Redstone, the 85-year-old chairman of Viacom and CBS, is watching his company's stock dive and its debt mount. The legendary mogul may soon be forced to sell off big chunks of his empire. But
even more painful for this latter-day King Lear could be the rift dividing his family.
A long-simmering feud with his 54-year-old daughter Shari has flared anew over issues of power,
money and succession. Redstone is also planning to divorce his wife Paula after five years of marriage and a widely publicized, storybook May-December romance.
Among his many money ills,
Redstone recently sold off a videogame company -- into which he'd poured an estimated $800 million -- for an embarrassing $100,000. Some suggest he might not even be a billionaire any longer. While
all media conglomerates are certainly hurting, Redstone's continued authority has magnified the problems for his public shareholders. Wall Street even has a name for the phenomenon: the Redstone
discount.
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