George Lucas backs Disney CEO Bob Iger in proxy fight with Nelson Peltz

we have some breaking news to share with you this morning check this out folks filmmaker and Hollywood Legend George Lucas is throwing his support behind Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger in that bitter proxy battle between the company and activist investor Nelson pelts Lucas who received 37.1 million Disney shares as part of Disney's $4.05 billion purchase of Lucas film back in 2012 is currently the largest individual investor in the company multiple sources have confirmed to CNBC it's not a well-known

fact you can't find this in SEC filings but Lucas is the largest shareholder and in a statement provided to CNBC Lucas wrote creating magic is not for amateurs when I sold Lucas film just over a decade ago I was delighted to become a Disney shareholder because of my long-term admiration for its iconic brand and Bob iger's leadership when Bob recently returned to the company during a difficult time I was relieved no one knows Disney better I remain a significant shareholder because I have full fa

ith and confidence in the power of Disney and Bob's track record of driving long-term value I have voted all of my shares for Disney's 12 directors and urge other shareholders to do the same now Disney has lined up a number of high-profile endorsements in its battle against pelts and his firm trian management from The Heirs of Walt Disney and Roy Disney to JP Morgan CEO Jamie Diamond but the support from Lucas that Endor ment is key not only as Disney's largest individual shareholder also becaus

e of his standing in Hollywood Lucas wrote and created the Star Wars and the Indiana Jones franchises which are some of the most popular films in history and he helped Pioneer tools like digital film editing and computer generated imagery so what he says matters I think Joe it's particularly key that Lucas said he was relieved when Bob Iger came back and uh that that is why he has remained a significant shareholder I think that's pretty important in going through this and again they've lined up

a lot of different endorsements this has been a very hard-fought battle already um that proxy battle ends on April 3rd that's when we'll see what happened with all of this Luke is saying that he has voted all of his shares and he's recommending that others do the same I wonder what he he's there'd be tax implications I guess if he sold shares oh sure so that's the reason for I mean is he Diversified if you don't believe I I don't know what we can GLE is that he must be bull I will tell you multi

ple sources have confirmed to me that he is the largest shareholder but you have some pretty significant shareholders that have come through one of what uh one of them is Ike pearlmutter who try and I I think has kind of put out and said that pearlmutter who used to be the chairman at Marvel there were three big deals that Bob Iger did those three huge ones would be seemed like he overpaid but didn't no $ 15.5 billion if you combined Pixar if you and Lucas and Marvel those three 15.5 billion dol

lars yesterday Disney put out uh a little bit of a peak behind the kimono just in terms of the returns you usually don't get anything even from the franchises that they won't tell you the profitability of these things but they did go out of their way to say that that $5.5 billion dollars that they spent on those three Deals were very wellmade I think they said they got three times the return on the capital they invested for Star Wars and Avengers uh fivefold increases on the capit they invested

in the Toy Story franchise just pointing out how these things have really been a flywheel because that has been one of Nelson peltz's big criticisms that he overpaid for all of those deals those three they showed you a little bit about how profitable those deals have been for the company I remember and it seemed like Steve Jobs just seemed like he took him to the cleaner with Pixar Powell jobs I I think was the largest individual shareholder at one point I I don't believe she is now but she owns

a owned a very substantial stake a bigger stake um because of the Pixar investment I don't know about Pixar anymore I think they kind of lost its way another Toy Story that's coming out they do yeah just don't think of it the same way uh not sure that's been I don't know if it anyone could have uh at this point it was obviously the the ground Breer and animation back then but it said you know there a lot of players the other thing that you have though is the content that it kicks out for the pa

rks right and what they are able to pick up and run with those things too um so again this is just the Next Step In The Saga that has become this proxy battle I think Bob Iger has pulled out all the stops and wants to make sure that shareholders understand his point of view from this a lot of times you have companies that don't come in and and kind of play Above The Fray on these things that hasn't been the case here I my guess I I don't know anything but my supposition would be that Bob Iger ca

me back from retirement for this probably doesn't want to deal well with an activist investor someone he clearly has not gotten along with on the board at the same time probably wouldn't make it a whole lot of fun right no and I'm still working my way through this uh ESPN piece man a lot of uh all media has some really daunting challenges they're actually talking about this guy that runs ESPN as a possible successor not the not the leading successor to Iger in 25 but someone that you you would n

eed to consider but um depending on what happens with the ESPN between now and then that could determine it too because that's a a microcosm of of the challenges that streaming presents for everyone you said they lost 30 million subscribers something like 30 million and I think profitability is down and I mean ESPN was the Crown Jewel all along what do you do with it but it is you're right it's indicative of the industry this right and um we haven't had an update on the we don't know the name of

it it be nice if you get the name so that we don't don't have to explain what we're talking about but for the fox ES PN War Warner Brothers sports streaming Enterprise we need a name for it so we can talk about it but I don't know where that I'm sure there's a lot going on behind the scenes right now I would imagine yeah