EU and British authorities unveiled new proposals this week to “crimp the power of ‘gatekeeper’ platforms like Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft, which policymakers argue deserve more oversight given their outsize influence.” In particular, the new measures would force these companies to do more to “prevent the spread of hate speech and the sale of counterfeit merchandise, and disclose more information about how services like targeted advertising work” - NYTimes and WSJ and MarketWatch
An update on suddenly hot Covid relief negotiations - NYTimes and Bloomberg
Massachusetts securities regulators are preparing to file a complaint against trading platform Robinhood Financial, “alleging the company aggressively marketed to inexperienced investors and failed to implement controls to protect them”—all in violation of state laws and regs - WSJ
Top SEC markets regulator Brett Redfearn will leave the agency at the end of the year after three years overseeing “exchanges, brokers and high-speed trading firms.” Redfearn is departing at the same time as his boss, Jay Clayton, who “appointed Mr. Redfearn to the role in October 2017” - WSJ
The Federal Reserve voted on Tuesday to join a network of central banks and financial regulators “focused on conducting research and shaping policies to help prepare the financial system for the effects of climate change.” The Fed’s been working with the group for the better part of the past year but hadn’t made it official before yesterday - NYTimes
Speaking of Chair Powell and friends, the FOMC breaks today, and it’s expected to focus on guidance for its “large-scale bond-buying program”—namely, whether to “ramp up or dial back bond purchases from the current pace of $120 billion per month, what specifically to buy, and how to communicate when they will stop” - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg
Online retailer Wish is poised to be the next tech startup to ride the recent IPO wave, announcing this week that it will price its shares at the “top end of its range” with hopes of raising more than $1 billion - Bloomberg and MarketWatch
A look at the role that “ubiquitous software company” SolarWinds played in the recently unveiled widespread cyber espionage campaign attributed to Russia’s foreign-intelligence service. The Texas-based SolarWinds provides software that many companies use to manage their networks, and the hackers appear to have exploited its products by adding “back door” code that “allowed them to launch further attacks against the SolarWinds customer and to steal data” - WSJ
Vanguard’s Total Stock Market Index Fund has become the “first of its kind” to cross the $1 trillion-in-assets barrier, a “testament to the rise of index-based investing over the past three decades” - Bloomberg
The return of lockdowns to some parts of the country has prompted the addition of a new phrase to the Daily Dose lexicon: “early quar”—as in, “panic shopping, bread baking, and ‘Tiger King’ were so early quar.” Enjoy this special form of time capsuling from the Times - NYTimes
Stay safe,
MDR
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