Prime the pump

MARKETS

• U.S. stocks: Stocks finished the week on a high note. The S&P closed at a four-month high, the Nasdaq reached an all-time high, and the Dow climbed back above 25k.
• Geopolitics: President Trump is meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Finland—investors will be watching.

E-COMMERCE

Priming You for Amazon's Big Day

Jeff Bezos's checklist:

Lead an $850 billion company
Become the world's richest person
Invent a holiday

That holiday, of course, is Amazon Prime Day

And like pretty much every other holiday, its main goal is to get you to buy a lot of stuff. But by offering over a million deals on everything from electronics to Whole Foods (new this year), it's just a little more explicit about it.

The shop-till-your-finger-ligaments-drop extravaganza starts at 3 pm ET today and extends a whole 36 hours—that's a first.

And who can take advantage? Amazon Prime members. They pay $119 a year for perks like free 2-day shipping, video streaming on Prime Video, Amazon Music, and more.

Breaking down the numbers

A few months ago, Amazon disclosed Amazon Prime membership numbers for the first time. And turns out, it's not such an exclusive club: Prime has more than 100 million subscribers worldwide.

Prime Day is also as good a time as any to soak in Amazon's absolute stranglehold of the online retail space. Research firm e-Marketer's got the latest digits:

• Amazon will do $258 billion in retail sales this year.
• The largest segment is computer and consumer electronics, accounting for a quarter of all sales.
• Of all online retail spend, Amazon captures 49.1%. Second place? eBay, with 6.6% of the U.S. market.

A little perspective: Prime Day is a big deal, but it's far from the busiest e-commerce shopping event in the world. China's leading online retailer, Alibaba, hosts "Singles Day" every year...and it makes Prime Day look like your neighborhood's lemonade stand.

• Last year, sales hit $25.3 billion. Amazon is expected to hit $3.4 billion this year.
• Shoppers spent $1 billion in the first two minutes.

+ Cut to the chase already. Fine, here's a list of Prime Day deals from Amazon.

MEDIA

The DOJ Appeals Media’s New Power Couple, but AT&T Seems Unfazed

On Thursday, the Department of Justice decided to appeal a federal court's decision to approve AT&T's $85 billion acquisition of Time Warner.

So will it be overturned? To the courtroom!

The case against overturning the decision:

• The judge who presided over the case was resolute: the creation of this media behemoth would not give AT&T too much negotiating power over TV providers.
• For it to be overturned, the Court of Appeals would need to determine the judge reached a verdict by misunderstanding the case's underlying laws.
• The merger already happened.

The case for:

• Per one antitrust expert, the judge may have reached an incorrect verdict.
• AT&T might not have too much negotiating power over TV providers, but it could have the power to increase prices for consumers. On that basis alone, the deal could get the ax.

Outcomes? If the DOJ wins the appeal, expect AT&T to re-appeal, sending this bad boy all the way to the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, AT&T will carry on hiring and strategizing with Time Warner (now WarnerMedia) under its wing.

AVIATION

An Airshow You Don’t Want to Miss

England may not have won the World Cup, but fans have something else to cheer "It's coming home" about: England's Farnborough International Airshow starts today.

Just picture it: Military jets and passenger planes zooming overhead, while 1,500 companies from over 52 countries show off their latest feats of engineering...there's a reason this is the most important aviation trade show of the year.

In fact, in 2016, nearly $124 billion in deals were locked in.

So what's in store for this year?

• Bloomberg got word that Malaysia's AirAsia and Airbus are discussing a deal for 100 planes worth $23 billion at list prices.
• Expect a lot of talk about how Brexit and trade wars are making life difficult for aviation execs.

Zoom out: Commercial aircraft manufacturing is a two-horse race between Airbus and Boeing. So far, Boeing's having a better year, more than doubling up Airbus on net orders.

BANKING

Reporting on Banks' Earning Reports

In Q1, big banks pocketed an extra $2.5 billion thanks to the tax cut. Did Q2 go the same way? We got a bit of a taste test on Friday.

• JPMorgan: The country's biggest bank by assets didn't disappoint, posting a record Q2 profit of $8.32 billion. The company's trading division was in peak condition.
• Citigroup: Coming in with shares down over 8% this year, Citigroup was hoping to build off JPMorgan's performance. But it didn't. Earnings topped estimates but were carried mainly by the tax cut.
• Wells Fargo: The good news? It hasn't had a scandal recently. The bad news? It's still paying for past scandals (read: unethical sales practices...among other issues). The bank missed across the board on sales and earnings estimates.

Was there any theme here? Maybe. Analysts pointed out lackluster loan sales for the quarter. That could be a result of the Fed raising interest rates coupled with economic uncertainty.

But we'll see if that trend picks up in the week ahead. Bank of America and Goldman Sachs...you're up next.

EVENTS

The (Earnings-heavy) Week Ahead

Strap on your earnings pants, we have a big week.

Monday: Amazon Prime Day; Leaders from the EU and China meet; Earnings (Bank of America, BlackRock, Netflix)

Tuesday: Fed chair Jerome Powell will testify before a Senate committee; MLB All-Star Game; Earnings (Goldman Sachs, Johnson & Johnson, Omnicom Group, UnitedHealth)

Wednesday: National Hot Dog Day; Earnings (Alcoa, American Express, eBay, Morgan Stanley, Novartis)

Thursday: Comic-Con starts in San Diego; Lumberjack World Championship; Earnings (Domino's, Microsoft, Unilever)

Friday: Earnings (GE)

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• Microsoft is strongly recommending regulation for facial recognition technology.
• Box office recap: There are no lengths The Rock won't go to to promote his upcoming movies, but they're not always as big as he is. Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, topped The Rock's Skyscraper in the U.S. and Canada, bringing in $44.1 million in its opening weekend.
• Elon Musk's political contributions are coming under the microscope.
• Netflix reports earnings this afternoon. We'll be looking out for subscriber numbers.

BREAKROOM

VIDEOS WE LOVE
As if Toys “R” Us needed any more humiliation, its mascot Geoffrey the Giraffe entered a wrestling ring to square off against an Amazon Prime box. You can guess who came out on top.

APPS WE LOVE
Motivation: Here's a new way to motivate yourself—a Google Chrome extension that turns your default homepage into a real-time age counter. Sounds depressing, but watching yourself grow older could just be the incentive you need to get up and get going. Try it out and decide for yourself.

TRIVIA
Which airline has the largest fleet in the world?

(Answer located at bottom of newsletter)

Breakroom Answers

Trivia
American Airlines