Financial Daily Dose 10.11.2021 | Top Story: Apple Appeals Epic Games Verdict, Seeks Stay of Enforcement

Apple has officially appealed the September verdict in its years-long battle with Epic Games that was set to “require the tech giant to tweak its strict App Store rules and force it to allow app developers of ways to pay for subscriptions and services outside the App Store.” It is seeking to stay enforcement of that verdict during the appeals process - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and Law360

Checking in with a less-than-stellar September jobs report, in which actual hiring underperformed expectations by some 300k jobs but were still “likely to satisfy the thresholds” Fed officials have “laid out to start reducing their bond buying at their policy meeting next month” - WSJ and MarketWatch and Marketplace

Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner is stepping aside for an undetermined period on medical leave. The “global toy, game and entertainment company didn’t specify” the medical issues Goldner is facing but “pointed to Mr. Goldner’s disclosure in August 2020 that he was undergoing continued treatment that might cause hair loss” - WSJ

As if the International Monetary Fund isn’t working through enough these days, what with the data-rigging allegations against the body’s president swirling around from her days at the world bank, the IMF is facing “foundational questions” as it meets this week about its potential role in “two of the biggest risks to the worldwide economy: the extreme inequality and climate change” as well as how much it should “venture onto the World Bank’s turf of long-term development and social projects” - NYTimes and Bloomberg

Digging a bit deeper on the new Tesla/Texas mashup to reveal a relationship that may make superficial sense but has, at its core, a disconnect between Elon Musk’s electrified vision and the state’s deep oil & gas industry ties - NYTimes and MarketWatch

The ongoing Theranos fraud trial and recent Ozy Media implosion have been a reminder that the rules that have kept every-day investors from hitting it big like private investors have on a range of unicorn startups may have also played an important role in keeping us from another dot-com bubble burst moment as these and other big-talk companies face their Emperor’s New Clothes moment - NYTimes

Concerns about possible monetary tightening from the Fed in coming months has helped propel Treasury Yields upwards in recent weeks, shaking markets and heightening fears that investors may be right to fear a less-than-robust economic recovery in 2022 - WSJ

Meanwhile, both investors and Fed officials like are also fretting about a long-lingering wave of inflation - Bloomberg

Oh, and since we’re stressing, let’s go ahead and add “shadow inflation” to the mix, too - NYTimes

SEC officials have subpoenaed Archegos Capital Management, the “$10 billion family investment office that suddenly collapsed in March, roiling the stock market as its losses reverberated through the banking industry.” While unsurprising, given the trouble Archegos caused, the subpoena “markets the transition into a formal investigation” into potential market manipulation - NYTimes and Bloomberg

While the FTC’s Lina Khan has drawn most of the buzz over the Biden Administration’s antitrust enforcement plans, the  Journal reminds us that the DOJ has quietly been making its own headway on the competition front, “despite not having a politically confirmed official to serve as antitrust chief” - WSJ

Leave it to the French to have turned the “humble roundabout” into a venue for public art - Bloomberg

Stay safe, and get vaxxed,

MDR