The daily business briefing: June 13, 2023

1. FTC asks court to block Microsoft's Activision Blizzard acquisition

The Federal Trade Commission on Monday asked a court to block Microsoft's planned $69 billion acquisition of video game maker Activision Blizzard. The FTC said the companies appear to be aiming to close the deal as soon as Friday, warning that it would give Microsoft the "ability and increased incentive" to keep popular Activision games like "Call of Duty" from rivals, and "substantially lessen competition." The acquisition would be the biggest ever for the software giant, and the largest ever involving a video game company. The FTC asked an in-house administrative judge to block the deal on antitrust grounds. European Union regulators signed off in May but British authorities blocked it in April.

Reuters

2. JPMorgan Chase reaches $290 million settlement with Epstein victim

JPMorgan Chase has agreed to pay $290 million to settle a potential class-action lawsuit accusing the bank of facilitating Jeffrey Epstein's sexual abuse of young women and girls. The lawsuit, filed by one of Epstein's accusers on behalf of herself and other victims, is one of several accusing banks of helping the late sexual predator make and protect his fortune. The bank did not admit guilt, but said in a statement: "We all now understand that Epstein's behavior was monstrous," and that survivors "suffered unimaginable abuse at the hands of this man." A month ago, Deutsche Bank, which took on Epstein as a client after JPMorgan dumped him in 2013, reached a $75 million settlement with victims.

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3. Fed expected to pause rate hikes after 2-day meeting

The Federal Reserve on Tuesday is starting a two-day meeting expected to end with a decision to pause the central bank's aggressive campaign to raise interest rates to fight high inflation. The Fed has hiked rates at 10 straight meetings, the fastest pace in four decades, but the economy has not slowed as much as expected, with hiring remaining strong and home prices remaining high despite rising mortgage rates. With inflation also proving stubborn, the Fed is expected to nudge borrowing costs higher at later meetings this year to bring inflation, now just under 5%, closer to the Fed's 2% target.

The New York Times Politico

4. Stock futures rise ahead of inflation report, Fed meeting

U.S. stock futures rose early Tuesday after the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq closed Monday at their highest levels since April 2022. Futures tied to the S&P 500 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq were up 0.1% and 0.4%, respectively, at 6:45 a.m. ET. Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average were flat. Oracle shares jumped 4% in pre-market trading after the software vendor reported better-than-expected quarterly results and revenue guidance. Stocks gained Monday as investors bet the Federal Reserve would pause its aggressive interest rate hikes at the end of a two-day policy meeting that starts Tuesday. The May consumer price index report comes out before the rate decision, with economists expecting an annual inflation rate around 4%.

CNBC

5. Reddit communities protest new developer fees

Moderators of thousands of sections of the popular online message board Reddit said Monday they were "going dark" for two days to protest Reddit's plans to charge new fees for access to data developers need to run apps on the site, which an estimated 57 million people visit daily. Organizers said some of the largest subreddits would be set to private, making them unavailable to the public, and called the charges "a step toward killing other ways of customizing Reddit." Reddit, which announced the changes in April, said it no longer wanted to give away the data to large-scale users like Google, OpenAI, and Microsoft that have been using it to develop potentially lucrative artificial intelligence systems.

NPR The New York Times