Big news in the streaming world late yesterday, with Disney announcing that was acquiring a 75 percent stake in BamTech and would be pulling all of its content from Netflix in anticipation of launching its own streaming services for sports programming (courtesy of ESPN) and Disney movies – NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg
Blackstone’s happily dipping a serious big toe in the Spanish real-estate market, acquiring a majority stake in Banco Popular’s portfolio (as the bailed-out lender seeks to tidy up its books after the Santander/EU bailout earlier this summer) – WSJ
Breakingviews suggests that stabilizing forex reserves in China could prompt Beijing to relax restrictions on the outflow of capital, possibly reinvigorating the offshore investment boom – NYTimes
California’s insurance regulator has its eyes on Wells Fargo, too – Law360
Bill Ford’s doing what he can to reinvigorate the “vision thing” at his eponymous auto company – WSJ
Lender PHH will pay $75 million to resolve claims by federal prosecutors that it originated mortgages backed by federal agencies that “did not meet the requirements for federal guarantees” – Law360
Here’s an interesting MarketWatch opinion piece on a key Amazon strategy for success: ignoring Wall Street in favor of the long view – MarketWatch
The DOJ has dropped its fraud case against PE firm founder Benjamin Wey after SDNY Judge Alison Nathan found that thousands of pages of documents were “illegally seized by the FBI” in 2012 as part of “overly broad” searches of Wey’s home and office in violation of his constitutional rights – Bloomberg and Law360 and NYTimes
In today’s trip into the uncanny valley, get a load of Honest Abe (and be amazed—and a little creeped out) – Garner Holt Productions