New front: Attorneys general from a group of 50 U.S. states and territories on Monday announced a sweeping antitrust investigation into Facebook and Google, opening a new front in what has become a multi-front, multi-jurisdictional assault on Silicon Valley’s giants. In addition to various state probes, the federal Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. Congress have all opened investigations into the market power of the tech giants and its impact on consumers and businesses across a wide range of industries. See my analysis of how the latest probes fit in with a broader movement, some of it emanating from Europe, to bring Silicon Valley to heel.
Second thoughts: Activist investor Elliott Management Corp. is not a fan of AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner and the telco’s efforts to turn itself into a media conglomerate. The hedge fund today disclosed a $3.2 billion stake in the company, which it plans to use as leverage to try to force AT&T to break itself up and sell off the non-telecom businesses.
Falling flat: Newly revealed testimony to the Copyright Royalty Board in 2017 shows that Apple wanted to reboot how songwriters get paid by music streaming services by switching to a flat rate fee per stream rather than dividing up a percentage of the platforms’ gross revenue. Many songwriters would likely have preferred Apple’s approach but the CRB said no.
Movie tokens: Tokenizing movie investment funds is becoming a trend. Actor/producer Wesley Snipes has partnered with the Liechtenstein Cryptoassets Exchange (LCX) to tokenize a $25 million fund that will be invested in movie and TV productions. The partners plan to issue a fully regulated security token to enable small investors to get a piece of Hollywood.