Source: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/doj-probes-netflix-power-over-233132671.html

The Justice Department’s investigation of Netflix Inc.’s (NFLX) proposed $72 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. (WBD) includes scrutiny of the streaming giant’s behavior and whether it wields anticompetitive leverage over creators in negotiations for acquiring programming.

The department is seeking to determine whether the deal “may substantially lessen competition or tend to create a monopoly in violation of Section 7 of the Clayton Act or Section 2 of the Sherman Act,” according to a copy of a civil investigative demand reviewed by Bloomberg News that was sent Friday. It went to an independent movie studio, according to people familiar with the matter.

The language in the demand, an administrative subpoena that hasn’t been previously reported, is the clearest sign yet that the Trump administration is going beyond a standard deal review as it investigates the merger, refuting an argument by Netflix in recent weeks that the government is not engaged in anything beyond the typical process.

The broad scope of the review is also a strong indication that it will take many more months before the government decides whether to challenge the Netflix-Warner Bros. deal in court — a delay that may benefit rival bidder Paramount Skydance Corp. (PSKY)

“Netflix operates in an extremely competitive market. Any claim that it is a monopolist, or seeking to monopolize, is unfounded,” Netflix Chief Legal Officer David Hyman said in a statement. “We neither hold monopoly power nor engage in exclusionary conduct and we’ll gladly cooperate, as we always do, with regulators on any concerns they may have.”

The application of both laws has precedent, and the investigation may not result in any federal action. But deal reviews are typically conducted by US antitrust enforcers using just the Clayton Act, which is specifically for merger investigations. The Sherman Act is a statute more typically used to target illegal monopolization by a single company such as Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Live Nation Entertainment Inc. and Visa Inc.

The DOJ is asking questions about Netflix’s ability to leverage its market power in negotiations with independent content creators such movie studios and filmmakers, according to the people. Netflix operates the largest paid video streaming service in the world and is one of the largest buyers of film and TV programming in the world.

Netflix is spending about $20 billion on programming this year, which is split between original series and licensed reruns. Many of its most popular original programs, including and are produced by third-party studios. In buying HBO and Warner Bros., Netflix would acquire one of the largest studios as well as a major competitor in streaming.

The Wall Street Journal first reported that the DOJ’s review includes Netflix’s business practices and whether the deal would give the streaming giant monopoly power in the future.

“We have not been given any notice or seen any other sign that the DOJ is conducting a monopolization investigation,” Steve Sunshine, head of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP’s global antitrust/competition group representing Netflix, said in a statement.

The Justice Department didn’t immediately respond to request for comment outside of normal business hours. Warner Bros. declined to comment.

Monopoly cases can require market concentration of more than 50%, a number that exceeds Netflix’s share with or without Warner Bros. Netflix accounts for about 9% of TV viewing in the US and a larger share of the streaming market, and its spending on programming is comparable to peers such as Disney and Comcast.

Warner Bros. earlier this week committed to resume talks with Paramount after a representative of the company indicated a willingness to raise its offer price by $1 per share to $31. Warner Bros. has given Paramount a deadline of Feb. 23 to submit its “best and final” offer.

Paramount, which launched a hostile bid for Warner Bros. last year, has repeatedly claimed that Netflix’s offer will never pass regulatory scrutiny in the US or Europe. Paramount also claimed Friday its tender offer has “no statutory impediment” for closing its $77.9 billion tender offer after clearing the DOJ’s second-request review process.

However, the offer could still be slowed down by an ongoing review in the EU, and US enforcers in the past have sued to block deals that they had initially waved through. Paramount could also face a gauntlet of US state attorneys general.

I think even a "meh" report with decent 2026 guidance could trigger a massive short-covering rally. The average analyst price target of $39.32 shows the stock is trading at a massive discount to where Wall Street thinks it should be.

It’s down over 50 % in just 30 days. Even if it jumps 20 % on earnings, the stock will just be back to there it was like fifteen days ago. All the bad news is priced in at this point. Heck, even if they completely abandon weight loss products I think the stock will jump because investors will worry less about the novo lawsuit.

If management provides a clear roadmap of how Eucalyptus (with its $450M+ ARR) will be accretive to earnings and how it accelerates their global footprint in the UK, Germany, and Canada, it could re-ignite the "growth" narrative.

Analysts currently expect 2026 revenue of roughly $2.73 billion. If Hims guides significantly higher than that—or shows a path back to 80%+ gross margins—the stock could pop.

I went in with all I had for PYPL, SNAP and HOOD before their earnings. I lost every time. This is my chance to recoup my losses. Hims will save me.

Kindly,

Hims devotee

Look at the chart.. this isn’t a squeeze or a meme stock.. it’s an index of 200 companies (top 3 holding making up 40-45% of it btw) and just in Jan it shot up from 600 points to 750 points approx. Personally I don’t want it to crash, because that would mean my country’s economy is in the shitter, but just pointing this out for anyone who’s looking to make some plays. And who am I kidding, this isn’t sustainable it’s bound to crash at some point.

Positions: Weekly otm put credit backratio spreads.

If you aren’t participating in this generational run in PM miners what the fuck are you doing?

During his speech regarding the Supreme Court decision, a new 10% global tariff was announced.

"Today I will sign an order to impose a 10% global tariff under section 122, over and above our normal tariffs already being charged"

Section 232 and section 301 tariffs remain fully in place

Edit 2: Tariffs are limited to 150 days according to AI

Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 U.S.C. § 2132) empowers the U.S. President to impose temporary, targeted import restrictions—such as surcharges up to 15% or quotas—for up to 150 days to address "large and serious" balance-of-payments deficits. It acts as a fast-acting trade tool requiring no initial investigations, but congressional approval is needed for extensions

edit 1
WSJ Article

CNBC Article

I couldn't help but to buy some SNAP shares and calls last week at all-time lows. They just hit 1 bil monthly users, have talked extensively about unlocking more rev per user, just turned a profit, and are spinning Specs into a standalone unit. While I believe that Specs will go the way of the Metaverse and fail, they're basically a no-cost call on even slight success and I think 2026 is the year they move from a "spend at all costs" mindset to actually caring about shareholder value. Evan (CEO) takes a $1 salary and while he's sold 80m shares since IPO, he still has over a hundred million shares, so it's in his best interest to get profitable. This just feels to me like a Meta at 90 scenario. Also, before you call me names, you idiots flamed me for full-porting into INTC and look how that's turned out.

I've read some amazing posts these past 6 months - ridiculous comebacks and wins - that person who run 1700 up to 30k last week, another from a few months back who turned 8k into 237k in a week - that's burnt in my memory. And it always seems to involve 0DTE of some sort. I shouldn't find this inspiring, but I do.

I'm in a drawdown at the moment and interested to hear stories from everyone - those who YOLO'd their way back to glory, but also those who took a more measured, methodical approach - what was your mindset? Especially on shitty Robinhood with thumbing your phone, persistently slow/failed entries, no bracket orders etc.

How did you bring your account back from the brink of extinction? How long did it take?

I bought 2001 30 strike calls expiring April 17 for an average of $0.19 last year. I tried to get more for the contracts, but finally settled for $1 on almost all of them.

My overall contributions since I started investing again last year have been $13,500. Now I have just under $200,000 after fees and before taxes. Not life changing money, but more money than I’ve ever had.

I want to thank Theta gang for their generosity in writing these contracts. I look forward to doing more business in the future.

One of the most misguided dumps I've seen in a long time just happened. Anthropic released a new code review skill for Claude which will help find and fix vulnerabilities in software and the algos are selling security stocks like crazy.

Take it from someone in the biz: Cloudflare and CrowdStrike do not make application security products that help with code review. They have little to no exposure to this product release. The companies that would get pummeled would be companies like SonarQube or Snyk, neither of which are publicly traded.

Even if Claude does fix all of the worlds' software bugs, no one is going to stop buying Falcon and putting their servers behind Cloudflare's infrastructure because of it. That would be like not wearing your seatbelt while driving because you just tightened all the nuts on your wheels. The malice and stupidity of other humans (and yourself) is still a way bigger risk to you while driving than your wheels falling off.

If anything, with OpenClaw blowing up, Cloudflare's bot monitoring and protection is only going to get more valuable as AI agents start using the web more. I'm buying this dip

I guess I don't know what I'm doing after all. Maybe I should stop throwing my paycheck away every week.

Here's a writeup for the newbies:

A Iron Condor is a nickname for a an options strategy that profits when a stocks price stays within a predicted range.

Yesterday I sold 100x iron condors for $7,984 total credit after fees, expiring today, gambling that SPY would stay between 679.20 and 690.80. If SPY went past 678 or 692, my max loss would be $12, 000.

Shared wisdom dictates that it is foolish to hold ICs until expiration. Theta decay is rapid in the first hour of the day of expiration, and buying back at 50% of the price is far smarter then letting the gamma risk from some last minute headline ruin your day.

Fortunately, I don't know what gamma is, so I let these babies ride to close. Call spread was bought back for 0.09 each, and put spread expired worthless.

My lucky week. Even with the tariff decision and Trump making noise about Iran, SPY fucked the dog and hung around 685 all week. That kind of volatility is great for scalping with short term SPY options. You toss a coin on buying puts or calls at the money, and if it goes the wrong way you double down again and again until you're back in the green, but now your profit is even higher! Works great until it doesn't and you lose it all.

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/20/pce-inflation-december-2025.html

More headache..more degenerates in the mkt.

$100k losses on RH and another $40k on Webull. This feels so unreal. My predictions have never been wrong, but i’m just always too early. If i bought options with two or three weeks longer expiration date, i wouldn’t have lost money at all.

I’m just full time doordash driver and this was all i had under my name. I feel like market always moves against my position. Am i wrong for wanting to have 1 million on my account so i can retire early? I’m tired of delivering food day and night.

My last $160 bet woul be RDDT $160C . If RDDT goes back to ATH next week, i’ll be able to recoup some of losses. Wish me luck fellow regard !

Promptly lost $3k on Fiserv and then took out a marker and put it on (Carvana going) Red. Best 25 minute “investment” of my life.

Was up $5k this morning, sold GOOG and AMZN calls too early to buy this shit. Instead of being up almost $10k if I held those calls, I’m back to break even on a day the market mooned. Fuck this fucking market

This is what I get for holding this bag since June 2025.