Axios

Google is working on building a Snapchat rival, the The Wall Street Journal reports. Sources say Google is in discussions with several media companies, including Vox Media, CNN, Mic, the Washington Post and Time Inc. about a product called "Stamp" which could be announced as early as next week.

Why it matters: In the race to win the attention economy, tech giants are looking to optimize ways they can deliver content, and especially news content, to audiences in a mobile-first format. Facebook's mobile-first news platform, Instant Articles, is facing backlash from some publishers while Snapchat's mobile-first content platform, Discover, continues to launch more partnerships.

Sinclair Broadcast Group shares were down Friday after Bloomberg reported earlier in the week that 21st Century Fox was considering moving its local affiliate broadcast partnership from its conservative rival to Ion, a Florida-based broadcasting company less than half the size of Sinclair.

• Sinclair has been expanding its conservative footprint for months. Rumors that Sinclair was in talks with conservative heavyweights Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity to form a rival network to Fox via WGN, a cable company acquired by Sinclair during the Tribune deal, intensified competition.
• 21st Century Fox declined to comment. Sinclair and Tribune did not immediately return requests for comment.
• Why it matters: Already the largest broadcaster in the country, Sinclair's $3.9 billion acquisition of Tribune Media Company this year will be expanding its reach (if regulatory approval goes through), making it an even bigger TV rival to Fox News Channel.

The U.S. economy added 209,000 jobs in July, while the unemployment rate fell slightly to 4.3%. Economists were expecting 180,000 new jobs and an unemployment rate of 4.3%. Three takeaways:

• Job growth for the first seven months of 2017 has averaged 167,000, slightly below the 2016 trend at this point last year of 184,00. Still, "employment growth remains strong enough to keep the unemployment trending down," 'High Frequency Economist' Jim O'Sullivan writes in a note to clients.
• Wage growth grew slightly, but according to University of Michigan's Justin Wolfers, "not enough to generate any threat to the Fed's inflation target." The Fed will likely take this report as a cue to refrain from interest rate hikes.
• The share of the unemployed who have been jobless for 27 weeks of more rose for the second straight month. The share of working-age Americans in the labor force was flat, suggesting the current healthy clip of jobs growth is not benefitting those at the labor market's outer edges.

The German discount grocer Lidl made its United States debut this June, opening 20 stores in the Carolinas and Virginia just weeks after its compatriot Aldi announced its own expansion plans in the U.S. earlier this year.

The timing could not be worse for established chains like Walmart and Kroger, which have simultaneously been digesting the news of Amazon's Whole Foods takeover. Unfortunately for Walmart, it's a move that indicates the e-commerce giant is turning its attention, and tolerance of razor-thin margins, to the lucrative grocery segment.

Battle lines: Lidl entered the market aggressively, with prices in its Winston Salem, NC, store that were 9.1% lower than the local Walmart, according to a study conducted in June by Jefferies analyst Christopher Mandeville. Given those results and Lidl's "enjoyable" shopping experience, he says Lidl could be "highly disruptive" to incumbents like Walmart.