Speculation that a CBS Corp.-Viacom merger announcement was imminent, and that CBS might score a slight premium for its shares, prompted Viacom's stock to fall in Monday morning trading.

The New York-based companies are in the final stages of reaching a merger agreement. Board members representing two firms, both controlled by the Sumner Redstone family, worked through the weekend to try to nail down final details — but still had not reached agreement on a price, according to a person familiar with the situation who was not authorized to comment. The merger agreement was expected to be announced Monday, but Bloomberg News noted that the “timing could slip into Tuesday.”

CBS is the larger of the two companies, and thus, it will absorb the smaller Viacom, whose assets include MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, BET and the Paramount Pictures movie studio in Hollywood. Nonetheless, the new company is expected to be named Viacom, in a nod to the legacy of ailing mogul Sumner Redstone, who acquired Viacom in 1987 and built it into an entertainment leader.

Viacom Chief Executive Bob Bakish is expected to become chief executive of the merged company and gain a seat on the board. Shari Redstone, the mogul's daughter, will become Viacom's first chairwoman.

Rite Aid has chosen a former insurance executive to replace longtime CEO John Standley to try to right the struggling drugstore chain.The company said Monday that Heyward Donigan will take over immediately for Standley, who's been CEO since 2010.The 58-year-old Donigan is a former executive with Premera Blue Cross. She most recently served as CEO of Sapphire Digital, which runs a technology platform that helps people shop for care.Donigan takes over a company that runs nearly 2,500 drugstores and lost $99.7 million in its first quarter. Rite Aid's board approved a reverse stock split this year to lift plummeting share prices and keep them on the New York Stock Exchange.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. government’s budget deficit rose by $183 billion to $867 billion during the first 10 months of this budget year as spending grew more than twice as fast as tax collections.The Treasury Department says the deficit for the current fiscal year through July is up 27 percent from the same period a year earlier. Spending rose 8 percent to $3.73 trillion, and tax revenue rose 3 percent to $2.86 trillion.President Donald Trump’s $1.5 trillion tax cut and new spending agreed to last year have swelled the gap between what the federal government spends and what it takes in.The Congressional Budget Office expects the deficit to begin exceeding $1 trillion per year in 2022.From combined wire services