Iflix, a Malaysia-based streaming video subscription service focused on Southeast Asia and the Middle East, raised over $50 million in what it refers to as pre-IPO funding.
Why it matters: Netflix needs to expand in emerging markets, as its recent subscriber numbers suggest saturation in its core geographies. Iflix, which claims to have nearly doubled active users to 17 million in the past 6 months, presents one of several homegrown hurdles.
Shares of embattled retailer JCPenney fell 17% on Friday after a Reuters report that the company had hired advisers to help restructure its debt in the latest effort to stave off bankruptcy.
Background: The stock fell 18 cents to close at 90 cents a share. It has traded near $1 since 2018.
The way people eat is changing, which means there is a giant market ripe for disruption and money to be made. However, most investors won't profit from the disruption because very few of the companies driving the change are public and that's unlikely to change anytime soon.
Why it matters: The lack of public opportunities to invest in food disruption despite the ravenous demand is the latest example of the broken U.S. capital market structure SEC chair Jay Clayton bemoaned at the annual Investment Company Institute meeting in May, noting that around 98% of American households have no access to private markets.
Although the U.S. government is still struggling to define regulations for the tech industry, it's finding ways to take action over the growing portion of the internet used by kids.
Why it matters: An increase in federal penalties against tech companies for violating kids' privacy rules is shaping new expectations for how the internet will be governed.
The big picture: After decades in which media consumption was dominated by domestic TV, we're entering a much more fragmented and international world. Services like Netflix and TikTok (the mobile video clip app that aspires to be the next Netflix) are global in scope and ambition. That sets them apart from forthcoming rival subscription services being planned by Disney, Comcast and AT&T.
White House senior adviser Stephen Miller defended President Trump's racist tweets and past criticisms of the United States on Fox News Sunday, claiming that unlike members of "the squad" of progressive lawmakers that he has attacked, Trump's comments come from a place of love for the country.
