While nothing has been finalized yet, the Six Flags stockholders did vote in an
overwhelming majority to approve the corporate merger with Cedar Fair this week. According to the reports the vote was over 67.36 million in favor of the merger vs 195,471 votes opposed to it.
As a reminder, keep in mind that Cedar Fair unit holders to not get to hold a vote, so the next step in the process is to wait and see if the US Department of Justice will sign their own approval of the merger, based on if they have any major anti-trust concerns that need to be addressed. There could be a few kinks in the road here that were not previously expected, as the DOJ has already blocked several major deals over the past year, such as the high profile block stopping the merger of Jet Blue and Spirit airlines. Other blocks in discussion right now also include the merger of Kroger & Albertsons grocery stores, Capital One & Discover, and a merger of Hawaiian and Alaskan Airlines, so with this in mind it is still possible that Six Flags and Cedar Fair could find themselves in the DOJ’s cross-hairs.
More than likely however, most believe that the DOJ will either allow the theme park merger to either proceed without interference, or allow it to proceed as long as a few terms are agreed upon, which could possibly involve the sale of park or two, or the dropping of a few management contracts for properties that they do not own such as Darien Lake or Frontier City.