WildBrain (WILD) was up 9% after announcing the $630M sale of its 41% stake in Peanuts to Sony, the franchise behind characters like Charlie Brown and Snoopy.

At $41M of recognized EBITDA, that prices the deal at nearly 15x - above the 13x WILD currently trades at…

… but the real story is the use of proceeds, with management planning to retire all ~$580M of debt - saving roughly $50M in annual interest expense…

… and freeing up the company to invest in wholly owned franchises like Strawberry Shortcake and Teletubbies.

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