Fed relief; Oil supply; Renault's decision - CNN

Fed Chair Jerome Powell said Tuesday that he's closely monitoring developments on trade. President Donald Trump's trade wars with Mexico and China have in recent days spooked markets, increasing attention on the Fed.

"As always, we will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion," Powell said at a monetary policy conference in Chicago.

Powell did not say whether a rate cut was needed. But his comments suggest the central bank is now considering a move to support the economy.

US stock futures indicate that gains will extend into Wednesday. The Dow is set to rise 80 points, or 0.3%. The Nasdaq and S&P 500 could jump 0.4% and 0.3%, respectively.

This optimism is global. Japan's Nikkei leaped 1.8% on Tuesday, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng index rose 0.5%.

Britain's FTSE 100 and Germany's DAX increased 0.3% in early trading. The CAC 40 in France advanced 0.5%.

US stocks on Tuesday logged their best day since January. The Dow closed up 512 points, or 2.1%. The S&P 500 also ended 2.1% higher. The Nasdaq climbed 2.7%, erasing earlier losses on concerns about increased tech regulation.

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2. Oil inventory: Data on US crude inventories will be released Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. ET.

Prices for US oil have been hammered recently by reports of excess supply. They've dropped more than 14% in the past month.

That's boosting anxiety amid fears that global economic growth is slowing, which could eat into demand for energy.

The World Bank on Tuesday cut its global economic growth forecast for 2019 to 2.6%.

3. Renault's decision: Renault's board will meet again Wednesday to consider a merger pitch from Fiat Chrysler.

If completed, the merger would create the world's third largest carmaker and lower the cost of developing new technologies. Investors want to know how the deal would affect Renault's existing alliance with Nissan (NSANF) and Mitsubishi Motors.

Renault's board said Tuesday that it had met to review the proposal "in detail" and will "continue to study with interest the opportunity of such a combination."

Shares of Fiat Chrysler (FCAU) in Milan fell 0.6% in early trading. Renault (RNLSY) stock rose 0.3%.

Want more markets? Watch CNN's "Markets Now" digital live show Wednesday at 12:45 p.m. ET.

4. Coming this week:
Wednesday — EIA crude oil inventories; US services data; American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) and Campbell Soup (CPB) earnings
Thursday — ECB and Reserve Bank of India rate decisions; Europe's GDP growth estimate; Beyond Meat (BYND) earnings
Friday — US jobs report

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/05/investing/premarket-stocks-trading/index.html

2019-06-05 09:16:43Z
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Mark Karpeles: My New Business Will 'Make Japan Blockchain Leader' - Bitcoinist

The former CEO of defunct cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox, Mark Karpeles, wants to start a new Blockchain business in Japan.

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Karpeles’ Blockchain Gift To Japan

Those were the plans Karpeles reportedly told the press in comments June 5, as he appeals a conviction for data manipulation as part of the Mt. Gox legal proceedings.

While details are sparse, the Associated Press (AP) claims he plans to use the “same computer technology” for the project, which Karpeles did not refer to specifically.

According to the AP, the 34-year-old Frenchman “wants to make Japan a leader in Blockchain technology.”

His words come following a turbulent few months for Mt. Gox. Japanese prosecutors had originally demanded Karpeles be found guilty of embezzlement and serve ten years in jail. He subsequently dodged those charges, instead being convicted of data manipulation and reportedly getting a two-and-a-half-year suspended sentence.

Lawyers are fighting even that charge, they revealed last month, as Karpeles has consistently protested his innocence throughout the exchange’s almost six-year legal debacle.

In 2013, funds totally 850,000 bitcoins disappeared from Mt. Gox, with suspicion falling on Karpeles regarding security and interaction with user money.

In 2018, as part of the rehabilitation proceedings, he publicly stated he would not be interested in claiming a ‘glut’ of 160,000 coins as a result of exchange rate fluctuations since the time users lost their funds.

“I don’t want this. I don’t want this billion dollars,” he wrote during a Reddit AMA session.

From day one I never expected to receive anything from this bankruptcy. The fact that today this is a possibility is an aberration and I believe it is my responsibility to make sure it doesn’t happen.

Karpeles Faces Refreshed Japanese Crypto Sector

While it remains to be seen what kind of project is now in the offing, it would not be a stretch to imagine another exchange-related endeavor.

As Bitcoinist reported, Japan’s domestic exchange sector is booming, with strict licensing and regulatory monitoring designed to ensure further significant breaches of consumer trust do not occur.

Mt. Gox was just the first in a series of Japanese exchange implosions, 2018 seeing over $500 million in altcoins leave fellow platform Coincheck, which has now relaunched under a new owner.

The sector has since gained interest from global corporations including Yahoo! Japan, which launched its newly-acquired exchange, Tao Tao, on May 30.

Just prior, a Japanese Blockchain fund revealed it was pumping $200 million into the operator of South Korean exchange Bithumb.

What do you think about Mark Karpeles’ plans? Let us know in the comments below!

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Images via Shutterstock

The Rundown

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https://bitcoinist.com/japan-mark-karpeles-crypto-business-bockchain/

2019-06-05 07:32:46Z
CBMiRWh0dHBzOi8vYml0Y29pbmlzdC5jb20vamFwYW4tbWFyay1rYXJwZWxlcy1jcnlwdG8tYnVzaW5lc3MtYm9ja2NoYWluL9IBAA

Congressional hearings signal growing antitrust problems for big tech - Ars Technica

Enlarge / The European Commission is investigating potentially false claims that Facebook cannot merge user information from the messaging network WhatsApp, which it acquired in 2014. Warsaw, Poland, on December 21, 2016. (Photo by Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

NurPhoto | Getty Images

The House Antitrust Subcommittee will conduct a series of hearings on the growing power of big technology companies, Chairman David Cicilline (D-R.I.) announced on Monday. It's the latest sign of growing interest in antitrust action against the largest technology companies—especially Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple.

"After four decades of weak antitrust enforcement and judicial hostility to antitrust cases, it is critical that Congress step in to determine whether existing laws are adequate to tackle abusive conduct by platform gatekeepers or whether we need new legislation to respond to this challenge," Cicilline said in a press release.

The announcement came shortly after news about a deal between the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission, which share responsibility for antitrust enforcement. Under the deal, the Justice Department will focus on investigating Google and Apple, while the FTC will be responsible for Facebook and Amazon. The Justice Department has reportedly begun an investigation of Google; it's not known if the agencies have begun investigating the other firms.

Facebook, Google, and Amazon stock all saw big declines on Monday.

These companies have become so large that it's difficult to predict which concerns will ultimately attract the attention of officials in Congress and the executive branch. Facebook runs the world's largest social network and owns Instagram and WhatsApp. Google dominates the search business and also owns YouTube and Android. Amazon leads in the cloud computing and e-book markets and owns retailers from Whole Foods to Zappos. If a company uses its dominance in one market to prop up its product in another market, that could run afoul of antitrust laws.

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https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/06/congressional-hearings-signal-growing-antitrust-problems-for-big-tech/

2019-06-04 17:19:00Z
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Powell, Eyeing Trade War, Suggests Fed Could Turn to Interest Rates if Needed - The New York Times

CHICAGO — Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome H. Powell, eyeing the potential for President Trump’s trade war to inflict damage on the United States economy, said that the central bank is prepared to act to sustain the economic expansion if needed.

“We do not know how or when these issues will be resolved,” Mr. Powell said of ongoing trade disputes between the United States, Mexico, China and other nations. “We are closely monitoring the implications of these developments for the U.S. economic outlook and, as always, we will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion, with a strong labor market and inflation near our symmetric 2 percent objective.”

Mr. Powell did not explicitly say that the Fed will cut interest rates but his comments send a signal that the central bank is watching Mr. Trump’s trade wars warily, ready to fend off any economic damage.

“He’s making a point to say to the markets that, ‘We can act if necessary,’” said John Briggs, a bond market strategist at NatWest Markets in Stamford, Conn. “I think the markets are taking some comfort, at least, by the idea that he’s moving in the right direction.”

While the Fed has been closely monitoring Mr. Trump’s trade dispute with China, Europe and other governments, Mr. Powell’s comments were his first since the president said that he would escalate his dispute by imposing tariffs on all Mexican goods.

Mr. Trump, speaking in London on Tuesday, said he was ready to punish Mexico with tariffs next week for failing to curb the flow of migrants across the Southern border.

“I think it’s more likely that the tariffs go on, and we’ll probably be talking during the time that the tariffs are on, and they’re going to be paid,” Mr. Trump said.

The decision to impose tariffs of up to 25 percent on Mexico — combined with growing concern over a prolonged trade war with China — has sent markets tumbling. They have gyrated as investors, bond markets and Wall Street analysts grow increasingly alarmed by the potential slowdown in growth that could result from expanded tariffs. The worsening outlook for trade over the last month has been accompanied by signs of weakness in global markets. Prices of key industrial commodities such as crude oil and iron ore have slipped.

After hitting a high on April 30, the S&P 500 was down nearly 7 percent through the close of trading on Monday. Yields on safe government bonds have tumbled worldwide, in a sign that investors see a weakening outlook for inflation and economic growth. And yields on some long-term Treasury securities are now below those of short-term bills, an unusual occurrence known as an “inversion of the yield curve,” which, in the past, has heralded recession.

Against that backdrop, investors have grown increasingly expectant that the Fed will abandon its “patient” stance and move to cut interest rates in the coming months. Fed funds futures markets are now placing a probability of more than 50 percent on the Fed reducing interest rates at its meeting at the end of July. Earlier in May, the market was putting less than 20 percent odds on such a move.

Mr. Powell’s comments on Tuesday slightly buoyed investors, who have already pinned their hopes on rate cuts this year.

Yields on short-term Treasury notes declined slightly after his comments were released. And stocks, which had been up before the speech was released, climbed further. The S&P 500 was up more than 1.5 percent by midday.

Taken with his colleagues’ recent statements, Mr. Powell’s speech signals that the Fed isn’t yet ready to lock in coming rate cuts. Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans said in a CNBC interview earlier Tuesday that he’s “comfortable” with where rates are at the moment. Mary Daly, head of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, also reiterated a call for patience during an interview with CNBC.

Officials are watching trade warily, however. In a speech on Monday, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, James Bullard, said that a cut in interest rates “may be warranted soon” in order to stoke inflation and “provide some insurance in case of a sharper-than-expected slowdown” in growth.

“The main story from Powell for near-term policy, in my view, is that this debate about whether the next move is a hike or a cut is effectively over,” Neil Dutta, an economist at Renaissance Macro Research, wrote in a note to clients following the speech. “They are no longer holding open the possibility of a hike.”

The president’s actions on trade have left the Fed in a tough spot. Growth remains above its longer-run trend and the job market is strong, which would argue against rate cuts. Plus, trade disputes could be resolved quickly, removing a major obstacle to continued expansion. But inflation is already low, and if a global slowdown drags on the United States economy, Fed rates are still historically low — which could argue for quick, decisive action, since the central bank’s recession-fighting ammunition is limited.

Mr. Trump himself has been pushing the Fed to cut rates, even contrasting the central bank with China’s.

“China is adding great stimulus to its economy while at the same time keeping interest rates low. Our Federal Reserve has incessantly lifted interest rates, even though inflation is very low, and instituted a very big dose of quantitative tightening,” Mr. Trump said in a tweet on April 30. He said that the economy would go up like a “rocket” if the central bank cut rates.

That also raises an optical problem for the central bank, which is independent of the White House. A move to cut rates could look political, even if it arose from a change in the economic landscape. Officials have reiterated time and again that they will make policy decisions based on the economic outlook, and that politics will not influence them in either direction.

After the Fed raised rates nine times since 2015, investors late last year began to grow concerned that monetary policy might be too tight, potentially risking the start of a recession. That helped send stock markets sharply lower, with the S&P 500 losing nearly 14 percent in the last three months of 2018.

Then, in early January, the central bank abruptly shifted its tone away from previous plans to continue lifting interest rates this year, and instead emphasized that it would remain patient, flexible and attuned to signals being sent by financial markets.

Some analysts question whether fresh Fed cuts would stimulate a similar reaction now. A decade into an economic expansion, lower interest rates might not measurably improve the outlook for corporate profits, the economy or the stock market, they say.

“This is just the reality of it,” said Michael Wilson, U.S. equity strategist for Morgan Stanley. “The Fed has done everything they can do to extend the cycle. And it might not be enough.”

Analysts have altered their forecasts for Fed policy in recent days and are now predicting as many as three rate cuts as concerns grow that the central bank will need to take drastic action to prop up the economy. JPMorgan and Evercore ISI now project a total of two interest-rate cuts starting in September, and Barclays predicts three cuts. That is up from previous estimates for either no cuts or a single rate cut for 2019.

Mr. Powell also focused on longer-run challenges facing the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, saying that rates near zero have “become the pre-eminent monetary policy challenge of our time.”

Against that backdrop, the Fed is concerned that inflation has been coming in below its objective for low and stable 2 percent price gains. The shortfall leaves it with even less room to cut interest rates, which include inflation, in a downturn.

“My F.O.M.C. colleagues and I must — and do — take seriously the risk that inflation shortfalls that persist even in a robust economy could precipitate a difficult-to-arrest downward drift in inflation expectations,” Mr. Powell said. He said that looking for ways to change the Fed’s policy strategy to strengthen its inflation-targeting credibility is “at the heart of the review.”

The central bank is also reviewing its approach to communication and its tool kit for combating economic downturns, and is expected to reach and report conclusions sometime in early 2020.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/04/business/economy/powell-fed-trade-wars.html

2019-06-04 16:41:15Z
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Fed's Powell, in dovish pivot, is prepared to respond if trade war escalates - Fox Business

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said on Tuesday the U.S. central bank is watching how global trade developments are impacting the U.S. economic outlook and is prepared to act as necessary to sustain the near-record expansion.

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“We do not know how or when these issues will be resolved. We are closely monitoring the implications of these developments for the U.S. economic outlook and, as always, we will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion, with a strong labor market and inflation near our symmetric 2 percent objective,” he said in a speech.

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Powell’s comments ahead of the “Conference on Monetary Strategy, Tools and Communications Practices” come in the midst of increased calls for interest rate cuts by the Fed.

The CME’s FedWatch Tool, which analyzes the probability of rate moves for upcoming Fed meetings, is currently predicting a 55.9 percent chance of a rate cut in July, with 49.7 percent of traders anticipating the benchmark federal funds rate will be moved into the 2 percent to 2.25 percent range. Only 13.6 percent of traders think interest rates will remain at the current range of 2.25 percent to 2.5 percent by September.

In his speech, Powell stressed that policymakers would respond if inflation remains persistently low, although he did not specify what actions the Fed would take. Core inflation currently remains below the Fed's 2 percent target, although it ticked up slightly in April.

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“In this setting, a similar low-side surprise, if it were to persist, would bring us uncomfortably closer to the ELB,” he said, referring to the effective lower bound for interest rates. “My FOMC colleagues and I must — and do — take seriously the risk that inflation shortfalls that persist even in a robust economy could precipitate a difficult-to-arrest downward drift in inflation expectations.”

Despite the more-dovish pivot, however, Powell avoided any other specific issues relating to the current economic condition.

The Fed has not cut interest rates since 2008 when it lowered the interbank lending rate to 0.25 percent -- essentially zero -- in the aftermath of the financial crisis. Interest rates remained at that level until 2015, when the central bank began tightening once again. The Fed has hiked rates nine times since 2015, including four times last year.

During the last Federal Open Market Committee meeting, Powell told reporters that policymakers did not see a strong case for moving in either direction.

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"We do think our policy stance is appropriate right now," he said at the time.

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https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/powell-in-dovish-pivot-says-fed-is-prepared-to-respond-if-trade-war-escalates

2019-06-04 15:43:49Z
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Powell says the Fed will 'act as appropriate to sustain the expansion' - CNBC

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank is watching current economic developments and will do what it must to keep the near-record expansion going.

Financial markets have been nervous lately over an escalating trade war that has spread from China and now could include Mexico. At the same, government bond yields are behaving in a way that in the past has been a reliable recession indicator.

Powell began a speech Tuesday in Chicago by addressing "recent developments involving trade negotiations and other matters."

"We do not know how or when these issues will be resolved," he said in prepared remarks. "We are closely monitoring the implications of these developments for the U.S. economic outlook and, as always, we will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion, with a strong labor market and inflation near our symmetric 2 percent objective."

Powell's comments came at the "Conference on Monetary Strategy, Tools and Communications Practices," a kickoff for an examination the Fed is conducting this year about the tools it has to meet its goals as well as the way it is communicating its actions to the public.

He did not address any other specific issues relating to current conditions. Market are broadly expecting the policymaking Federal Open Market Committee to cut its benchmark rate twice before the end of the year in response to current conditions.

For his part, Powell has stuck to the position that the Fed remains data dependent. The most recent FOMC statement, from its May meeting, indicated that the committee is taking a patient stance toward policy changes at conditions evolve.

Looking down the road

In his speech Tuesday, Powell took a longer view, outlining the challenges the Fed faces ahead for when the next crisis hits. The current low rate environment leaves the Fed little room before it hits the zero lower bound, or the point where the Fed's nominal benchmark rate can't be lowered much more.

"In short, the proximity of interest rates to the ELB has become the preeminent monetary policy challenge of our time, tainting all manner of issues with ELB risk and imbuing many old challenges with greater significance," he said.

The Fed faces a problem with inflation, which has yet to sustain at the central bank's 2% goal. Powell said persistently low inflation could lead to "a difficult-to-arrest downward drift" in expectations.

At issue for the future are three main considerations: where current policy is enough to address inflation misses; if the Fed's toolkit of rate moves and asset purchases is enough to achieve the dual mandate of full employment and price stability, and how best to communicate policy to the public.

One consideration is whether the "dot plot" of individual FOMC members' rate projections is helping. Powell suggested that during times of stress, the closely followed "median dot" actually could become the "least likely outcome."

Powell said the tools used during the crisis — near-zero rates and asset purchases that took the balance sheet to more than $4.5 trillion — are likely to be deployed again.

"Perhaps it is time to retire the term 'unconventional' when referring to tools that were used in the crisis. We know that tools like these are likely to be needed in some form in future ELB spells, which we hope will be rare," he said.

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https://www.cnbc.com/2019/06/04/powell-says-the-fed-will-act-as-appropriate-to-sustain-the-expansion.html

2019-06-04 14:31:33Z
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Silicon Valley in the crosshairs: Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple face bipartisan onslaught - Fox News

Big Tech's moment of reckoning has finally arrived.

After years of expansion and disruption, while seeming to escape regulatory scrutiny relatively unscathed in the United States, the world's most powerful tech companies are suddenly staring down the barrel of a bipartisan gun that could severely curtail their growth, subject them to invasive probes, saddle them with new regulations and potentially force them to break up.

In recent days, antitrust investigators at the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice have set their sights on four of the largest players in Silicon Valley: Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple. The two U.S. agencies have reportedly decided to divide and conquer, with the Justice Department taking the lead on investigating Google, while the FTC is set to examine the practices of Amazon.

Facebook, which came to an agreement with the FTC in 2011, has been rumored to be close to a new deal with the agency that would subject it to billions in fines and new regulatory oversight around privacy. Apple would fall under the purview of the Justice Department, which has a history with the Cupertino, Calif. company. The Justice Department found in 2014 that Apple engaged in a conspiracy with five publishers to increase the price of ebooks, ultimately costing the company $450 million.

YOUTUBE ALGORITHM PUSHES VIDEOS WITH CHILDREN TO PEDOPHILES, REPORT SAYS

"This is more of a warning to the companies that they’re being carefully scrutinized and they need to be careful not to play fast and loose given their dominant positions in the digital marketplace," Gene Kimmelman, a former senior antitrust official at the Justice Department who is now president of the consumer group Public Knowledge, told The New York Times.

From left: Apple CEO Tim Cook, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Big Tech is facing a regulatory reckoning.

The antitrust scrutiny comes as lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have vowed to curtail the power of Big Tech, which critics say has stifled competition and innovation while allowing the spread of misinformation and hate speech. A number of Democrats running for the 2020 presidential nomination have called for greater regulation of Silicon Valley but Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. has put forth the most aggressive proposal to break up several tech giants on antitrust grounds.

The House Judiciary Committee on Monday announced a bipartisan investigation that will use the power of subpoenas and public testimony to focus on three key areas: documenting competition problems in digital markets; examining whether dominant firms are engaging in anti-competitive conduct; and assessing whether existing antitrust laws, competition policies and current enforcement levels are adequate to addresses the issues.

"Unwarranted, concentrated economic power in the hands of a few is dangerous to democracy – especially when digital platforms control content. The era of self-regulation is over," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement on Twitter, adding that the probe is "long overdue."

Shares of Facebook and Alphabet, which owns Google, both tumbled on Monday, pulling the Nasdaq Composite Index into correction territory.

TINDER REQUIRED TO PROVIDE USER DATA TO RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT: REPORT

"Technology has become a crucial part of Americans' everyday lives," said Antitrust Subcommittee Ranking Member Jim Sensenbrenner, R-WI, in a statement. "As the world becomes more dependent on a digital marketplace, we must discuss how the regulatory framework is built to ensure fairness and competition."

The tech industry poured $77.9 million into lobbying U.S. lawmakers in 2018, compared with $16.4 million a decade earlier, The Wall Street Journal reports. Both Google and Amazon have also funded more than 30 nonprofit groups, including think tanks on the left and the right, that have a voice in the public debate over antitrust, according to the Journal.

However, all of that money may not be enough to stave off regulators and investigators.

People familiar with the investigations told Reuters that neither the Justice Department nor the FTC has contacted Google or Amazon about any probes, and that company executives are unaware of what issues regulators are reviewing.

The world's largest online retailer, Amazon, has faced heat for the power it wields over third-party sellers on its platform. The Seattle-based tech giant has also been criticized for damaging traditional retailers, although government regulators did allow its purchase of Whole Foods to proceed in 2017.

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Apple is being examined by the European Union thanks to a complaint from streaming music company Spotify that Apple has abused its power over app downloads. Although Apple has frequently touted the privacy of its hardware and taken subtle shots at Facebook, a new report suggests that a range of different iPhone apps are sending out users' information to third parties. The Tim Cook-led company recently announced that it was killing iTunes.

In April, Facebook said it expects to be fined up to $5 billion by the FTC, which has been probing the social network's role in sharing the data of 87 million of its users with the data-mining firm Cambridge Analytica. The Menlo Park, Calif. company, which also owns WhatsApp and Instagram, has been slammed by critics over the proliferation of fake news on its platform.

“We’re still waiting on long overdue FTC action on Facebook’s violated consent decree,” Sarah Miller, co-chair of Freedom From Facebook, a group which has called for the social network to be broken up, said in a statement to Fox News via email. “Facebook’s violation of the consent decree already gives the FTC grounds to break up Facebook’s monopoly, and they should. But, a potential bigger-picture antitrust investigation is also long overdue."

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The FTC previously settled an investigation into Google in 2013 with a reprimand, but the Sundar Pichai-led firm has been fined multiple times by European regulators in recent years for anticompetitive practices. According to ad research firm eMarketer, Google is expected to capture 37 percent of the $129 billion spent on online ads in the U.S. in 2019, compared to 22 percent for Facebook and 10 percent for Amazon.

"After four decades of weak antitrust enforcement and judicial hostility to antitrust cases, it is vital for Congress to step in to determine whether existing laws are adequate to tackle abusive conduct platform gatekeepers or if we need new legislation," said Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman David Cicilline, D-RI, in a statement.

Still, not everyone agrees that Silicon Valley's biggest tech companies should be broken up.

“The Justice Department’s investigation of Google will come to the same conclusion as the FTC’s did in 2013 -- that there is no antitrust case,” said Carl Szabo, VP of NetChoice, an e-commerce trade association, in a statement to Fox News. "It’s illogical that the DOJ is investigating competitors in the same market for monopoly behavior. Amazon, Apple, and Google all compete with each other in a vibrant and competitive marketplace."

Google, Facebook and Amazon did not comment on the record for this story. Fox News also reached out to Apple.

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https://www.foxnews.com/tech/google-facebook-amazon-apple-bipartisan-onslaught

2019-06-04 14:27:25Z
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