A proposed class action filed in federal court in California on Tuesday accuses Google of “surreptitiously amass[ing] billions of bits of information—every day—about internet users even if they opt out of sharing their information.” The complaint seeks upwards of $5 billion in damages – Bloomberg and MarketWatch and Law360

Highlights (term used generously) from Zuck’s response to the Facebook employee protest that we discussed here yesterday, which was largely an exercise in defensiveness – NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and MarketWatch and Mashable

Banking regulators are exploring an enforcement action against Deutsche Bank for the lender’s long relationship with disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, including the dozens of accounts it held for him until shortly before he died. According to sources, the “investigation focuses, at least in part, on the bank’s decision to continue doing business with Mr. Epstein even after employees raised concerns” – NYTimes and Bloomberg

As protests in reaction to the police killing of George Floyd have spread far and wide beyond the Twin Cities, German-based Adidas has gone out of its way to express support for protesters (to mixed reaction on social media), even as it shutters “dozens of American stores, just two weeks after reopening some of them for the first time in months” – NYTimes

For the record, Microsoft is nowhere near ready to concede the workplace conferencing and collaboration space to slick upstarts like Zoom and Slack. Not even close – WSJ

Monsanto, in appellate briefing in California state court this week, urged the panel to overturn the $78 million verdict against the company over allegations that its weedkiller Roundup causes cancer by arguing that the claim was “preempted by federal law because it focuses only on Roundup’s labeling—which is the purview of federal regulators” – Law360

A new study from Harvard researchers finds that “[h]ighly indebted public companies that employ millions of people” were largely, by design, “left out of the major direct relief options that Congress, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury have devised to help companies make it through the pandemic.” Which may be good for avoiding some of the 2008-era bailout criticism, but should the markets turn again (and friends, I wouldn’t bet against it), there could be major trouble – NYTimes

Also thrown for a loop by the pandemic—investors in securities backed by Italian banks’ non-performing loans (NPLs), instruments aimed at helping banks “still reeling from last decade’s debt crisis” clean up a “big pile of bad loans that were weighing” on banks’ books. All looked good until Covid hit and created a coming wave of more NPLs – WSJ

Twitter has named Patrick Pichette, ex-Google CFO, as the company’s new board chair – MarketWatch

Since this is one of those weeks when the world feels like it’s on its ear, I’ve got for you the science of the fresh smell that clotheslined laundry acquires as if by magic – NYTimes

Stay safe.