Viacom owns a chunk of the WWF

Quoting a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Reuters news agency is reporting that Viacom now owns a 14.3 percent stake in World Wrestling Federation. The stake that Viacom has in the WWF was previously disclosed as part of the deal between Viacom and the WWF when Viacom won a court case against the USA Network for the television rights to show World Wrestling programming.

USA's contract expires in September and the WWF will move to The Nashville Network in October. TNN cancelled its contract with Extreme Championship Wrestling to make way for the WWF.

A family run business since its inception, the WWF has not allowed outside owners to buy into the federation for years. It was only in October of 1999, that the WWF starting making shares in the company available to the public.

In this afternoon's trading, WWF shares were down 5/8 to 20-1/2 in afternoon trading on Nasdaq. They have a 52-week high of 34 and a low of 9-3/4.