consumer

The Federal Communications Commission voted 2-1 in favor of allowing TV station ownership groups to own more outlets, easing the way for more consolidation.

The Thursday vote that favored the change means companies can own local stations that cover more than 39% of the U.S. They could also own more than two stations in a single market.

The measure supported by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr will allow the agency to approve deals that put station ownership groups over the cap if the agency determines that they are promoting the public interest. Carr has said the agency would consider such issues as commitment to local journalism and “viewpoint diversity.”

“In my view, if you care about trusted sources of local news and information, you have to care about the future of local TV stations,” Carr said. “They are the economic engines that produce the paychecks for so many of the local journalists that remain in the business. So how can the FCC maximize the odds that those institutions continue to survive and hopefully thrive into the future? To start, we should stop hamstringing this one segment of the broader market with outdated restrictions.”

The station groups say the ability of tech companies such as Google and Netflix to reach every consumer in the U.S. puts them at a disadvantage. At the same time, streaming now accounts for more than 40% of all viewing, according to Nielsen, pulling consumers away from traditional TV. Television stations are also seeing their share of carriage fees from cable and satellite companies shrink due to cord-cutting.

Declining viewership and revenue have also made it more challenging to sustain multiple local TV news operations in a single market.

Anna Gomez, the lone Democrat on the commission, opposed the measure, saying the rule change will only help big firms get bigger and more powerful.

“Eliminating the cap does not free local broadcasters from economic pressure, it just changes who is doing the squeezing,” Gomez said in a statement issued ahead of the vote. “The large station groups positioned to grow even larger under this decision are not local broadcasters, they are national companies that own local stations and increasingly dictate what airs on them.”

The measure ending the cap limits also faced push back from consumer groups and state government officials who believe station consolidation will result in journalist layoffs and fewer voices for the communities they serve.

TV station owners and its lobbying group the National Assn. of Broadcasters have been clamoring for a change in the rule, citing the changes in technology that have occurred since the ownership limit. The 39% threshold was set in 2004 when streaming video was still a nascent business.

Jeff McCall, a professor of communications at DePaux University, agrees the current limit is outdated in the current media environment. “Local broadcasters are struggling in terms of audience and revenue, and this plan could give them some needed relief,” he said.

But McCall added that having the FCC decide who benefits from the rule change will face resistance.
“it will give the FCC wide discretionary powers and open up any decisions to second-guessing and, of course, court challenges,” he said.

There are also likely to be questions on how even-handed Carr will be when faced with a proposal that puts a station owner over the caps. The chairman has made his name by threatening to pull the broadcast licenses of TV stations that irritate President Trump with their coverage and commentary. Even Trump-supporting Republicans such as Sen. John Kennedy, R- La., have raised concerns the FCC’s scrutiny of broadcast content could be violating the right to free speech.

In April, the FCC called for an early review of the licenses for Disney’s eight broadcast TV stations, a day after Trump demanded that ABC fire late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over a joke about First Lady Melania Trump.

Carr also questioned whether ABC’s daytime show “The View,” where negative Trump commentary occurs often, should qualify as a bona fide news program that is exempt from giving equal time to qualified candidates.

Carr also believes large media companies such as Disney and NBCUniversal parent Comcast hold too much sway over the stations affiliated with their networks.

“New York and Hollywood interests have steamrolled those local TV stations and the broader media market in recent years in ways that run directly counter to the regulatory framework that Congress and the FCC put in place,” he wrote. “Their national programs naturally reflect the values of the New York and Hollywood executives that produce them. This power imbalance has contributed to a steady decline in locally produced news — and with it, a weakening of the public’s trust in the media.”

Earlier this year, a group of attorneys general filed suit to block Nexstar Media Group’s proposed $6.2-billion acquisition of Tegna, arguing it violates a 112-year-old U.S. antitrust law by knocking out a major competitor. The deal would give Irving, Texas-based Nexstar control of 265 television stations across the country, up from 164. And, in dozens of markets, including San Diego and Sacramento, Nexstar would own multiple TV network affiliates.

U.S. District Judge Troy L. Nunley issued a preliminary injunction in April that forbids Nexstar — which owns KTLA-TV Channel 5 in Los Angeles — and Tegna, from combining operations. Nexstar is appealing.

NBCUniversal’s Peacock is stretching its wings by joining the subscription YouTube Premium service — a significant boost for the streaming platform that has struggled to find its niche in the increasingly crowded landscape.

NBCUniversal and YouTube on Monday announced the multi-year partnership. Beginning early next year, Peacock will be available as part of YouTube Premium’s U.S. subscription bundle, which also includes ad-free videos and music.

The pact represents Peacock’s largest wholesale distribution agreement to date, one that will introduce the service into millions of new homes.

On Friday, NBCUniversal owner Comcast disclosed the service had finally reached profitability in the second quarter after billions of dollars of investment.

The important benchmark comes as Comcast prepares to spin off NBCUniversal entertainment and news media businesses into a separate company. Peacock, which launched in 2020, grew its paid subscribers by 4% to 48 million in the second quarter, compared to the first quarter.

Comcast has long tried to make Peacock an asset for its Xfinity broadband and cable TV subscribers, but recently began to expand its partnerships in recognition that consumers were getting overloaded with pricey choices.

As part of the agreement, NBCUniversal’s linear television channels will remain on the YouTube TV service.

“This partnership brings NBCUniversal’s world-class content and iconic franchises to YouTube’s unmatched scale and global platforms,” Mike Cavanagh, NBCUniversal’s chief, said in a statement. “We’re excited to deepen our relationship with YouTube through a collaboration that reflects our strategy of partnering with industry leaders to drive sustained growth for NBCUniversal.”

The deal will give YouTube, owned by Google, a bevy of sports, including NFL football, NBA basketball, soccer and Major League Baseball.

“We’re incredibly excited to expand our partnership with NBCUniversal to redefine what a modern entertainment subscription can be for consumers,” YouTube Chief Executive Neal Mohan said in the statement. “YouTube Premium brings your favorite creators, artists and cultural moments together uninterrupted, and now, we’re pairing that ultimate viewing experience with Peacock’s expansive lineup of live sports.”

Only a few days ago, Paramount Skydance’s planned $111-billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery appeared to be on the glide path to completion.

The deal, which would be the largest merger in Hollywood history, had won approval from several foreign governments and, on June 12, Justice Department antitrust regulators.

The Justice Department’s assent looked to be a major step toward fulfilling the ambitions of David Ellison, the son of multibillionaire tech tycoon Larry Ellison, to bring together Paramount and Warners, which owns CNN and CBS among other properties, under one roof.

The Justice Department’s action ignited suspicions that the Ellisons had profited from their support of President Trump. But it has turned out not to be the last word on the deal. The very next day, California and 11 other states filed a motion to block the merger, stepping in where the Justice Department chose not to tread.

“I will not let Warner Bros. and Paramount merge without a fight,” California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said in announcing the states’ action. A hearing on the motion is scheduled for Friday in San Francisco federal court.

There’s more to this development than an effort to block Ellison’s attempt to repave the entertainment landscape for his own benefit, even though, as my colleague Meg James reports, the states’ motion “poses a major headache” for Ellison. It’s also a pointer toward a major restructuring of antitrust enforcement in the United States.

Customarily, state regulators have piggybacked on antitrust cases brought and managed by the federal government. The feds generally have greater resources than most individual states to conduct the investigations that can lead to antitrust lawsuits. States often have relied on the government to craft consistent and coherent theories of antitrust law to undergird their lawsuits.

But the Trump administration’s apparent pullback from aggressive legal pursuit of allegedly anti-competitive mergers has left a vacuum that states have moved to fill. That’s what’s driving their motion to block the Paramount-Warner Bros. deal.

Dating back to the first Trump term, California and other states have enacted new laws resembling federal statutes requiring merger proponents to provide detailed information about planned deals.

States also have filed their own lawsuits to challenge anticompetitive conduct by pharmacy benefit managers and algorithmic pricing that has driven up housing rents via alleged collusion.

States may have an advantage over the federal government in that their regulators can move faster on complex cases than the feds. That’s what happened in the fight against the proposed 2023 merger of supermarket companies Kroger and Albertsons, something that was widely feared to presage higher prices at the shelf.

Although the Federal Trade Commission moved to block the merger, so too did Oregon, Washington and nine other states in court. The companies called off the merger after a state court in Washington and a federal court in Oregon, ruling on that state’s lawsuit, simultaneously enjoined the merger on Dec. 10, 2024. One day later, Albertsons dropped the proposal.

Some supporters of effective antitrust enforcement suggest that the states’ involvement in these cases could be an effective counterweight to the mercurial approach taken toward enforcement under Trump, which seems to be driven by personal pique, as Paul Glastris, editor of the Washington Monthly, has written.

In 2017, Trump’s Justice Department sued to block AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner, driven by Trump’s irritation over the coverage he received from CNN, which was owned by Time Warner. (I described the lawsuit as Trump’s doing the right thing for the wrong reason.) The merger eventually went through.

The best example of the states’ willingness to supplant the feds as antitrust enforcers in chief is the antitrust case against Live Nation Entertainment. The federal government and 30 states originally filed the case in 2024 in federal court in Manhattan. The lawsuit sought to break up Live Nation, which has controlled scores of top concert venues, in part by forcing it to divest Ticketmaster, the leading entertainment ticketing firm.

A few days after the trial began this spring, the Justice Department reached a settlement with Live Nation. The settlement led to accusations that the White House interfered in the Justice Department’s work on the case, including that Trump himself personally pushed for a settlement and that the deal was reached without the participation or even the knowledge of the Justice Department lawyers handling the case or of the state attorneys general who were participating. The White House referred my request for comment on these accusations to the Justice Department, which didn’t respond.

The states, asserting that the settlement wouldn’t cure Live Nation’s alleged violations of antitrust law, took over the lawsuit — and won. In mid-April, a federal jury found that Live Nation had maintained a monopoly over the live events business, exposing the company to the states’ claims of as much as $700 million in damages and a possible order that it sell Ticketmaster. The company says it will appeal.

The history of antitrust enforcement in the U.S. generally resembles the complaisant stance taken under Trump. Since the enactment of America’s first antitrust statute, the 1890 Sherman Act, industry has generally benefited from lax enforcement, in part because antitrust theory has been ever-changing. During the New Deal, President Franklin Roosevelt suspended antitrust enforcement so his National Recovery Administration could pursue its mandate to suppress industrial competition, which was thought to drive up prices and thereby foster the Great Depression.

The Supreme Court overturned the National Recovery Administration in 1935, though it had already lost credibility. Roosevelt responded in 1938 by appointing Thurman Arnold, a critic of existing antitrust theory, as the Justice Department’s antitrust chief. In his writings, Arnold implied that antitrust law as then interpreted was a fraud aimed at acclimating consumers to ever-larger business combinations through the pretense that “unfair” or “immoral” deals would be barred.

Arnold’s appointment marked what may have been the most productive period in antitrust enforcement. By the time he departed for a federal judgeship in 1943, he had brought more than 50% of all the cases brought under the Sherman Act in its half-century of existence. He broke the auto industry’s stranglehold on consumer auto lending, and started a case that concluded with the Hollywood studios’ forced divestment of their theater chains.

Since then, there have been a few notable antitrust successes, including the 1982 breakup of AT&T. That resulted from a Justice Department antitrust lawsuit launched in 1974. But the consolidation of major industries into fewer and fewer participants, especially in entertainment, has continued with very few roadblocks.

Occasionally, an aggressive enforcer comes into office. That happened under Lina Khan, whom President Biden appointed as chair of the Federal Trade Commission. (The FTC shares antitrust oversight with the Justice Department.)

Khan’s published academic work had taken aim at what she called the lax antitrust treatment of companies such as Amazon. Her argument was that antitrust enforcers’ focus on whether a monopolizing company brought consumers lower prices overlooked the longer-term consequences of giving companies the unfettered right to build market share at the expense of competitors and the free market.

Amazon “has evaded government scrutiny in part through fervently devoting its business strategy and rhetoric to reducing prices for consumers,” Khan wrote in a key article. Once it reached a critical mass, she argued, nothing would stop Amazon from extracting monopoly rents from consumers.

Khan’s aggressive stance on antitrust law earned her the enmity of targets such as Amazon and Facebook, which tried to force her to recuse herself from FTC cases against them. She refused, but due to corporate distaste for her policies, Trump replaced her as FTC chairman on his inauguration day last year.

The Paramount-Warner Bros. deal could be a key test of states’ authority and willingness to take over antitrust enforcement from the federal government. That’s because they’ll be fighting not only resistance from the merger partners, but the government’s conclusion that the deal poses no threat to consumers.

On the other hand, their case at least will be free of the suspicion that the government’s approval owed more to Trump’s friendship with the Ellison family than to sober, painstaking analysis of how reducing the number of big entertainment companies from five to four would be good for the rest of us.

July 14 (UPI) — The consumer price index for the year ending in June rose 3.5%, less than economists expected, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday.

For the month, consumer prices fell by 0.4% due in part to the energy index dropping by 5.7%. It was the largest decline in the energy index in more than six years, following a spike in energy prices due to the Iran war and closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

The consumer price index decline for the month followed a 0.5% increase in May, also making the decrease a six-year best for a single month.

The energy index remains high for the 12 months ending in June, up by 15.7%. This is bolstered by a 26.7% increase in the index for gasoline.

Energy services decreased by 0.7% on a per-month basis, putting the annual rate of inflation at 3.9%. Electricity fell by 1% to an annual 4% increase while utility gas service rose by 0.5% to an annual 3% rate of inflation.

June’s index beat estimates by the Dow Jones consensus, which projected a 0.2% decrease in the consumer price index with annual inflation at about 3.8%.

The index for all items not counting volatile food and energy, known as core inflation, remained steady between May and June. Core inflation measured at 2.6% for the year ending in June after reading at 2.9% in May.

The index for food rose by 0.2%, as did the indexes for food at home and food away from home. The annual index for food rose by 3%.

Tuesday’s report comes as new Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh appears before Congress. In his prepared remarks, Warsh will tell Congress that the “number one objective is to get monetary policy right.”

“That is our clear and constant aim, the star we steer by,” Warsh’s prepared statement reads. And if we get policy right — and we will — the inflation surge of the last five years will be a thing of the past.”

Nexstar Media Group’s The Hill, the political web site that started as a free newspaper read in most congressional offices in Washington, is launching a new direct-to-consumer streaming service that will be behind a paywall.

Starting Wednesday, Nexstar will offer The HIll Insider, which will carry daily streaming video programs and newsletters. Subscribers will also be able to interact with The Hill’s journalists and analysts, who will take questions live.

The service, available for $5.99 a month or $59.99 a year, is the first digital subscription product for the Irving, TX-based Nexstar, the largest owner of television stations in the U.S. Premium memberships are available for $9.99 a month, or $99.99 a year, which will be ad-free and offer access to live events presented by The Hill.

The endeavor is the first subscription streaming service offered by Nexstar. The Hill already produces a free ad-supported streaming channel distributed on such platforms as Roku.

The free version of The Hill is the most viewed political web site in the U.S. with 1.24 billion page views in 2025, a year-to-year increase of 7%, according to Comscore. The Hill is known for offering brisk, up-to-date reports out of each branch of government in Washington, and is often linked to on other websites.

Nexstar, which also owns the cable network NewsNation, acquired The Hill in 2021 from New York-based entrepreneur James Finkelstein for $130 million. NewsNation adapted The Hill brand name for its Washington-based programs, including a Sunday roundtable show with Chris Stirewalt, politics editor for The Hill and NewsNation.

NewsNation politics editor Chris Stirewalt on the set of “The Hill Sunday.”

(NewsNation)

Stirewalt and the Washington journalists and commentators seen on NewsNation programs will be featured on The Hill Insider. The service will also use the resources of Decision Desk HQ, the political media firm that was the first to call President Trump’s victory on election night in 2024. Decision Desk will be involved in a streaming show called “Data Nerds.”

The Hill Insider will be aimed at the political junkie who wants to go deeper on polling data and hear longer, in-depth discussion on issues. Bill Sammons, senior vice president of editorial content for Nexstar, said the company’s research shows there is a national appetite for such content, as only 5% of The Hill’s current audience is based in Washington.

The Hill has long touted itself as non-partisan and Stirewalt hopes users will gravitate to the subscription version to become better informed about legislative and political issues and not reaffirm their existing opinions.

“My imagined audience is of people in America who are not addicted to politics but are addicted to good citizenship and the idea of fulfilling their civic virtue,” Stirewalt said in a recent interview. “And they would like to do it in a way that doesn’t insult their intelligence.”

While the free version of The Hill has been growing, the new subscription product enters a crowded field of digital programs and platforms aimed at the consumers of political news.

The launch comes as journalists from legacy media such as former CNN anchor Jim Acosta, former ABC News correspondent Terry Moran, and Chuck Todd, the longtime moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” have launched their own daily podcasts and newsletters as second acts in their careers.

MS NOW, the progressive-leaning cable news channel, is entering the direct to consumer market later this year making the channel available outside of pay-TV packages for the first time. Like The Hill Insider, the MS NOW streaming product is expected to offer users additional benefits, such as access to live events and content not seen on the cable network.

Original topical programming that does not have a shelf life is challenging to sustain on a streaming service. When Fox News Media launched its streaming service Fox Nation in 2018, it carried a line-up of live, politically-oriented shows aimed at its conservative-leaning audience. The service eventually pivoted to documentary, movies and lifestyle programming and became the home of the annual Fox News fan event, The Fox Nation Patriot Awards.

Consumer discretionary stocks remain in focus as companies navigate shifting consumer spending, travel demand, e-commerce growth, and evolving economic conditions across retail and leisure markets.

In light of this, below is a list of the top S&P 500 Consumer Discretionary holdings

Fox Corporation has agreed to acquire the streaming platform Roku Inc. in a deal valued at $22 billion, the companies announced Monday.

The deal will combine the Murdoch family’s media assets, which include its news, sports and broadcast channels, with the San Jose-based streaming platform that reaches 100 million consumers globally.

The acquisition would give Fox access to consumer households at a time when the traditional pay-TV universe continues its slow decline as viewers move away from cable and satellite services to video streaming. Fox already owns the free ad-supported streaming service Tubi, which recently became profitable.

“This is a defining moment for Fox and a natural extension of the deliberate and focused strategy we have been executing for nearly a decade,” Fox Corp. Executive Chair Lachlan Murdoch said in a statement.

By owning Roku, Fox gets access to data from the 100 million households connected to the service, which can be used to better target audiences with advertising. The combination would also make Fox less dependent on traditional pay TV platforms for the distribution of its channels.

According to Nielsen data, 21% of all internet-connected TV viewing comes through Roku. The Roku Channel, which carries 500 ad-supported streaming networks, accounts for 3% of all TV viewing.

An image of a Roku branded TV.

(Roku)

Research firm Emarketer projects ad revenues of $3.57 billion for Roku this year, up 19% from last year.

Lloyd Grief, chief executive of the Los Angeles investment bank Greif & Co., said Roku would have been challenged to compete against far better capitalized competitors in the streaming business and that a sale was “inevitable.”

For Fox, the proposed deal makes them a larger player in the digital advertising business. Emarketer senior analyst Ross Benes said the Roku business will “more than double,” the company’s revenues in that area.

“It remains to be seen how well the combination of a digitally innovating streaming company will mesh with a media conglomerate rooted in legacy assets,” Benes said.. “But the strategy makes sense and it jibes with the continual consolidation that’s occurring in streaming.”

Fox sold its TV and movie production assets to Walt Disney Co. in 2018. Rather than invest heavily in scripted entertainment to compete with emerging streaming companies, Fox decided to concentrate on sports and news.

The Roku deal will put Fox deeper into the distribution network. Over its history, the company has held stakes in satellite TV provider DirecTV and Sky TV.

The companies said they are committed to keeping Roku as a “partner-friendly” platform that carries program services that compete with Fox. Brian Wieser, a consultant at Madison and Wall said that might require some convincing.

“Other content owners may still need Roku’s distribution, but they may be less comfortable with the idea that one of their competitors controls an increasingly important part of the streaming interface,” Wieser wrote in his note on the proposed deal.

Roku shareholders will receive a combination of cash and Fox Corporation stock valued at $160 a share.

The companies say they expect cost savings of $400 million in the combined entity.

Roku was founded in 2002 by Anthony Wood, a British digital entrepreneur. The company launched a streaming device, the Roku player, in 2008. Within six years, the company sold more than 10 million devices, as the popularity of streaming video rapidly grew.

Fox Corp. shares were down 10 to 15% on news of the deal, trading around $55.57 Monday morning. Roku shares were down slightly to $142.

Times staff writer Wendy Lee contributed to this report.

The state of California is leading an effort to prepare a possible lawsuit that could thwart Paramount Skydance Corp.’s planned acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, a potential obstacle for the $111 billion deal.

The lawsuit, which could be filed as early as this month, would likely involve multiple states, according to a source familiar with the deliberations who was not authorized to comment publicly.

The litigation would seek to challenge the proposed merger on antitrust grounds, arguing it would thwart competition, lower wages and lead to widespread job losses.

“The Paramount acquisition of Warner Brothers remains an active investigation, and we do not have any updates to share at this time,” said California Atty. General Rob Bonta’s office in a statement.

In a statement, Paramount said it “will continue to fight against any attempt to derail a deal that plainly benefits consumers, creators and the industry as whole.”

“Opposing this deal means opposing expanded consumer choice, new opportunities for creators and workers, and greater competition throughout the creative ecosystem — the opposite of what antitrust law is meant to achieve,” the company added.

Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders in April approved the sale of the company to Paramount after Netflix dropped out of the auction.

Under Paramount Chairman David Ellison’s proposal, Warner investors would receive $31 a share, nearly four times the price of the company’s stock in April 2025. He also said he will keep both studios’ release schedules of 15 movies a year for a total of 30 films a year.

Nonetheless, Ellison and his team have vowed to make $6 billion in cuts following the merger, which requires regulatory approval. The combined company would have to contend with $79 billion in deal debt.

The prospect of substantial job cuts during a period of downsizing in Hollywood has ignited widespread opposition to the sale.

Thousands of people who work in the TV and film industry, including actor Joaquin Phoenix and director-writer-producer JJ Abrams signed an open letter opposing Paramount’s planned acquisition of WBD, saying it would lead to fewer production jobs and fewer choices for consumers. Others have also raised concerns about the impact it could have on content.

“The consequences would be felt nationwide, from destroying CNN the way that Ellisons have devastated CBS to entertainment industry job losses and consumers losing access to independent voices and a competitive market,” said Norm Eisen, executive chair of Democracy Defenders Fund, one of the groups that organized the open letter. “State attorneys general have both the authority and the responsibility to act when a transaction of this scale directly threatens the public’s interest, and I hope states across the country will join any effort to challenge this deal,” Eisen said in a statement.

The potential lawsuit, first reported by Bloomberg and Reuters, is being considered by other states, including New York and Colorado.

“Paramount and Warner Bros. haven’t cleared regulatory scrutiny,” Bonta told The Times in March. “My office has an open investigation into [the deal] and we intend to be vigorous in our review.”

Despite the potential obstacle, Raymond James equity analysts said in a note on Thursday that they “still believe the deal is likely to close.”

Last month, Paramount hired antitrust attorney Jeffrey Kessler to defend its planned acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. Kessler recently led a case for state attorney generals against concert promoter and ticketing firm Live Nation, resulting in a win for states, including California.

“We also think there are win/win solutions to be had particularly in California given exodus of production from CA in recent years and efforts to bring production back to Hollywood,” the analyst said in their note.

New research from the European Central Bank suggests that the economic impact of the Iran war may be affecting euro zone consumers more deeply and rapidly than previous geopolitical crises, raising concerns about inflation, slowing growth, and long term economic uncertainty across Europe.

According to ECB economists, European consumers appear to be reacting more sensitively to rising prices and economic instability because many households are still psychologically affected by the financial stress caused by the Russia Ukraine war and the energy crisis that followed in 2022.

The latest conflict involving Iran, triggered after United States and Israeli airstrikes earlier this year, caused major disruptions to global energy supplies and reignited fears of another inflation shock throughout Europe.

ECB researchers found that consumers quickly became more attentive to price increases even while inflation remained close to the central bank’s 2 percent target. Economists believe this reaction reflects growing public anxiety over repeated geopolitical and economic disruptions.

Why It Matters

The findings raise serious concerns for Europe’s economic recovery because consumer confidence plays a critical role in spending, investment, and overall growth.

When households become highly sensitive to inflation and uncertainty, they often reduce spending, delay purchases, and increase savings out of caution. This behavior can weaken economic activity and slow recovery across key sectors including retail, manufacturing, housing, and services.

ECB researchers warned that Europe may now face the risk of a more persistent stagflation environment, where inflation remains elevated while economic growth slows simultaneously.

The Iran war also exposed Europe’s continuing vulnerability to global energy shocks. Despite efforts to reduce dependence on Russian energy after the Ukraine conflict, Europe remains heavily exposed to disruptions in global oil and gas markets.

Although oil prices have recently eased amid hopes for diplomacy, they surged sharply earlier this year during the height of the Iran conflict, intensifying inflationary pressure across the euro zone.

Key Stakeholders

Several major stakeholders are directly affected by the growing economic uncertainty surrounding the Iran war and Europe’s inflation outlook.

European Central Bank

The ECB faces increasing pressure to balance inflation control with economic stability. Policymakers are now widely expected to continue raising interest rates in an effort to prevent inflation expectations from becoming entrenched among consumers and businesses.

European Consumers

Households across Europe remain at the center of the crisis. Rising living costs, energy prices, and borrowing expenses continue placing pressure on disposable incomes and consumer confidence.

Businesses and Industries

European businesses, particularly energy intensive industries, face higher operating costs and weaker consumer demand. Continued uncertainty may reduce investment activity and slow hiring across multiple sectors.

Energy Markets

Global oil and gas markets remain highly sensitive to developments in the Middle East. Any renewed escalation involving Iran could rapidly push energy prices higher again, directly affecting inflation and economic stability in Europe.

Governments Across Europe

European governments may face growing political pressure if inflation remains persistent while economic growth weakens. Policymakers could be forced to increase public spending or introduce additional support measures for households and industries.

Future Outlook

The coming months are likely to become a critical period for the euro zone economy as European policymakers attempt to manage the combined effects of geopolitical instability, inflation concerns, and slowing growth.

Much will depend on whether tensions in the Middle East continue easing or whether new disruptions emerge in global energy markets. A stable diplomatic environment could help reduce inflationary pressure and restore consumer confidence gradually.

However, ECB researchers warn that the psychological impact of repeated crises may continue shaping consumer behavior long after energy prices stabilize. Many Europeans who experienced financial stress during the Ukraine war now appear quicker to react to fears of inflation and economic instability.

The ECB is therefore expected to maintain a cautious but firm monetary stance in the near term, with additional interest rate increases remaining highly likely.

If inflation remains elevated while economic growth weakens, Europe could face a prolonged period of economic stagnation combined with reduced consumer spending and higher borrowing costs.

The situation highlights how modern geopolitical conflicts increasingly influence not only energy and security policy but also consumer psychology, market behavior, and long term economic confidence across global economies.

With information from Reuters.

A visitor has filed a $5-million lawsuit against Disneyland for allegedly failing to properly disclose the use of facial-recognition technology at park and collecting sensitive data on guests.

Summer Christine Duffield of Riverside County filed the lawsuit after a May 10 visit to Disneyland and sister park California Adventure, alleging that the resort violates privacy and consumer protection laws collecting biometric data of visitors, without adequate consent.

“Disney does not adequately disclose the use of their biometric collection, so consumers — which almost always include children — have no idea that Disney is collecting this highly sensitive data,” the plaintiff noted in the lawsuit. “Guests should be able to expressly opt in to this type of sensitive facial recognition technology with written consent — the onus of privacy rights should not be on the victim.”

The suit was filed on May 15 in U.S. District Court in New York. The lawsuit cites an article from The Times on consumer reaction to Disney’s use of facial recognition.

The Walt Disney Company didn’t respond to a request for comment.

“People are getting fed up with being force-fed new tech, new AI, new tracking tools,” said Ari Waldman, Professor of Law at the UC Irvine.

Walt Disney Co. rolled out its facial recognition technology in late April across Disneyland Resort to verify tickets. The way it works is guests’ faces are scanned, converted into a numerical identifier and matched with ticket data.

Disney’s privacy policy notes that the identifiers created for identification are deleted within 30 days unless they need to be kept for legal or fraud prevention purposes.

Guests who don’t want to use the technology can enter through a separate entrance marked with a silhouette of a head and shoulders with a slash through it. However, of the dozens of lines to enter Disneyland and California Adventure, there were only four that didn’t use facial recognition, during an April visit.

The sign saying “Use of this technology is optional,” adorn the security checkpoint entrances.

“This technology facilitates ease of reentry into our parks and helps prevent fraud,” the company noted in its website.

Use of facial recognition technology for crowd management and ticketing has become increasingly commonplace.

Dodger Stadium deploys facial recognition for guests using the “Go Ahead Entry” at certain gates without producing a physical or digital ticket to enter the stadium. At Intuit Dome in Inglewood, visitors can use “GameFaceID” to quickly move through a separate lane with their face as their ID.

The lawsuit comes at a time when there is increasing concern of surveillance in public places, and privacy advocates have rallied against the normalization of surveillance. More recently, concerns of the potentially abusive use of artificial intelligence by government to analyze large quantities of data — from texts to facial scans — to surveil U.S citizens resulted in a high-profile showdown between the Pentagon and Anthropic.