CBS CEO: All Surprised by Comcast-Time Warner Cable Deal -CNBC

CBS Corp. (CBS) Chief Executive Les Moonves said Thursday everybody was "pretty surprised" by the news of Comcast Corp. (CMCSA) purchasing Time Warner Cable Inc. (TWC) for $45.2 billion in stock, announced Thursday morning.

"We were all surprised by what happened," he said in comments on CNBC. "We had all heard the chatter about Charter (Communications Inc.) trying to elect their own board, but as usual (Comcast CEO) Brian (Roberts) and (Comcast Cable CEO) Neil (Smit) did this deal under cover, under wraps" while we thought they were in Sochi and they were making a huge deal.

In terms of the impact on CBS, he said it was still too early to comment on all the ramifications.

"We're still looking at the ramifications, but we have a wonderful relationship with all the terrific people at Comcast, and if this goes through -- we look forward to working with them," he said.

"It's way too early to decide what we like about it or what we don't like about it," he said.

Mr. Moonves said CBS was finding a "great market" for its content and that the upshot of all this is that "for those of us who create great content, there are more and more buyers."

If you have the right content you're always going to have the power on negotiating, he said.

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