Chief megan murphy. Lets talk about the business theion, looking at some of effects happening between qutar looking at some of the effect happening between caps on qatar and its arab neighbors. Megan a continuing fallout that keeps unfolding in the middle east between qatar and some of its neighbors. This is what has happened with bahrain, saudi arabia, the uae they are accusing them of , harboring islamists and not cracking down on terror. It has been a longrunning incident between them, and it has no really included in terms of imposing bans. Is now imploding in terms of imposing bans. One of the biggest businesses affected is qatar airways. Oliver a company doing very well. Megan doing very well, voted a favorite of Luxury Travelers in particular. As people know, whether it is emirates or qatar airways, they are brands that have carved a global footprint out of the last two or three decades, moved into competing directly on longhaul flights in particular with some of the american carriers. There has been a big concerted effort by the american carriers, american, delta, united, to push back on that growth. Whether or not it is through slots at american airports, saying they are getting unfair competitive advantage through the offense the advanced sovereign wealth. The American Airlines would argue it props up the businesses. And now they are facing this much closer to home, having to redraw routes, having to skirt borders. Oliver big borders. Canadian very, very big borders. It will have a big effect on the business. Oliver is this something they view that they can wait out and resolve the sort of political hurdles that are there . And does not seem like it will be resolved anytime soon. Megan it is an incredibly murky diplomatic incident. There are very different viewpoints, including between the president and his administration. Some people in the department itself is the socalled cause of say the same old socalled cause of this are factors that led to it and is not quite clear who is behind it, what actually happened, and whether or not it can be resolved immediately. Frankly, it is not getting enough attention because so much of the American Media and foreign media is focused on the Trump Administration writ large. Never underestimate these airlines in terms of their willingness to push forward. We would not be in the situation where we had really strong carriers, beloved carriers if they had not put so much resources into establishing these brands. It establishes these brands. They have overcome this. Whether this is a temporary blip or longterm thing that will force him to take much bigger costcutting measures to the brand is going to play out in the next few months. Oliver in the features section, also the u. S. Cover story, a great examination by Felix Gillette on a Big Media Company and perhaps a growing one. What was the most interesting part of the story to you . There is politics, media, there is interesting characters. Megan Sinclair Broadcasting is probably the most interesting and powerful Media Company that many i think businessweek readers and others locally will not have heard of. It really points to a company that has 173 stations, mostly in smaller markets. Some mediumsized markets, some bigger washington, d. C. Is an , idiot example. D. C. Is an example. Trying to get this deal which are being to purchase more stations has put them in the big markets like l. A. , new york, etc. What is interesting is yes, they have a chairman who is very conservative and has pushed conservative political views and does so in these news broadcasts that they do in these stations, but also is someone who has done it with an almost bizarre focus on costcutting. This is not glamorous broadcasting standards, a lot of shine and razzmatazz. This is really barebones media really pushing these views, pushing their idiosyncratic view word viewf a better , of things the way they deal with paid placement. We cover a story where someone went to the mcdonalds drivethrough, a reporter it is a media takeover by someone you would never really expect to handle this kind of thing. Oliver it is a fascinating story about a company that has lesseaching but perhaps name recognition. We have more from our reporter. You have to acknowledge the Sinclair Broadcast Group is one of the big winners in the Media Business in terms of the current milieu in washington with the Trump Administration. This company for years has been run by a family. It is a big supporter of republican politicians and causes. During the president ial campaign, after initially supporting ben carson, they kind of their weight behind donald trump. Having won the election, trump has now created a Regulatory Environment that is very good to Sinclair Broadcast Group. Oliver ok, so in the sense that the election of donald trump has been good for media because it brought in a lot of views, and has a get for this particular media group because their vision is somewhat aligned with trumps . Because they have for years been running into regulations in terms of limiting ownership of local media in the United States, which is limited to 39 of the viewership for the United States for broadcast tv stations. And they were really right at the limit. And then what happened oliver any single regional market . Felix no, the whole country. When trump won, his appointment to lead the federal Communications Committee voted to restore an arcane rule that allows broadcasters like sinclair to discount essentially half of the audience from the uhf station. What this did is basically they restored this rule and weeks later sinclair announced the biggest deal in the companys history, announcing they were acquiring Tribune Media for close to 4 billion. Stage, ok, so to set the this company owns different weas of broadcast stations, are talking local news, not talking cable. You turn on the tv and here is what happened around you. They want to essentially extend that to basically more cities and more areas . Felix yeah. They are already the largest owner of broadcast stations in the country. They own 173 stations currently. After the tribune acquisition, which is currently under review most people think it will go through. Oliver is that going to be dead before the Trump Administration felix under Hillary Clinton it just would not have happened. The their regulation, now this acquisition will give them another 42 stations, including stations in a lot of big markets where they traditionally have not operated. New york, los angeles, chicago. Oliver big major cities. Felix big major cities. They want to have essentially a nationwide network of broadcast stations. Ultimately their goal, which they have been working on behind the scenes, is pushing the fcc to adopt a new broadcasting standard. Some people call it next gen tv. When that is approved by the fcc, which could happen later this year on a voluntary basis, Companies Like sinclair will be able to start broadcasting in these new standards which will free up a lot of bandwidth to do other things. Sinclairs vision is instead of just having one channel from the broadcast stations they on own locally they will start , broadcasting a bundle of 25 to 30 channels. Leslie also think they will be a will to sell various Data Services from those stations. But it is sort of a nationwide network, and it is mobile, it is something you could get on your telephone or your tablet without having to pay for cellular data charges without you can watch it in your living room tv without having to pay a cable or satellite provider. Oliver up next are facebook, google, amazon, and apple too big for their own good . Carol plus alibaba wants to dominate commerce. Where the company is setting its start. Oliver this is Bloomberg Businessweek. Carol welcome back to Bloomberg Businessweek. Im carol massar. Oliver i am oliver renick. You can also find us online at businessweek. Com. Carol and our mobile app. Oliver a growing number of scholars and regulators want to stop facebook, amazon, google, and apple from getting any bigger. Carol but that may be easier said than done. Here is the reporter. Almost without noticing, these companies have gotten huge not just in the united , states for globally. Let me just throw out a few numbers because i think it really hits home. Google has 77 of the search advertising revenue. Facebook has 75 of mobile social traffic. Amazon has 70 of the ebook market. So those are monopoliessized figures. There are no doubt that these are monopolies. There is no court ruling, but this is what a traditional antitrust theory says is a monopoly. So almost without looking they have gotten so big, and so well, who cares . Big is not bad. We have gotten over that issue a long time ago. There are now some studies showing their bigness may have some bad repercussions. Because these are academic studies, and they are positing this. It is not proven, but there is enough of this research to show there is reason to worry. Oliver that brings us to the why now . As a stock market reporter, we write time again about how they have really been the major contributors to a lot of the bull market rally. The facebook, the googles, the amazons paula we love them. Oliver exactly. The size question has not really come under scrutiny until now. It feels like something that maybe people should be talking about. How come it has gone overlooked . Paula it has been bubbling below the surface for quite a few years now. There is a gentleman named kaplan who wrote a book called move fast and break things. And he is the one who is strongly pushing this idea that these are these companies are too big. And he comes from the perspective of the creators of content, musicians, photographers, journalists like us, book authors. Of that they have been robbed or cheated out of their revenue because google, facebook, amazon have cornered that market. Now he used to be the manager of a rock n roll band, for bob dylan and the band and things like that. Then he went on to run the annenberg innovation lab. And so he has a very interesting perspective. He was an m a investment banker for merrill lynch. Sophie has a very interesting perspective from all of these angles. And he is one of the major pushers of this idea that they are too big. But academics have also started looking at this. There are several studies showing that it is not that the issue is not that consumers are not benefiting. The issue is that this bigness is leading to things like inequality in wages, low productivity, the lack of startups. Oliver perhaps some of the answers to a lot of economic questions people have. Paula these are questions economists are asking all the time. What is the matter with our economy . Why are we growing faster . Arent we growing faster . What is productivity growth so slow . Whats the matter with our economy . All of those roads are leading to amazon, facebook and google. Carol speaking of ambitious technology companies, alibaba wants to build chinas Sports Industry. Oliver we talked to our editor. We are making a stronger flavor than anyone in the Chinese Market has to develop a Sports Industry that has been unrepresented in china and in other places. Oliver alibaba does not seem like they need to seek out new Revenue Sources yet. I mean i guess it never hurts to keep expanding. I wonder why they are doing this now, why they are taking the measures to really break off teams and money and give it support. Jeff they just reported earnings that were well beyond most analysts expectations. It is projected for the fiscal year ending in march they will see Revenue Growth between 45 and 49 . So it does seem like they are saying now is a good time to start thinking about a five to 10 year window to finance this relatively tiny sports arm. A lot of runway to figure out how to build a sports market there. Oliver it does not seem like it is something that is terribly urgent or the need to get it. It seems like from your justters writing, lets get the ball rolling. Jeff the quotes in the story just a matter are really saying what about financial Revenue Growth as a Financial Strategy overseas. Oliver if im reading this, as an investor this sounds , pretty good. My company is, why not . Lets explore more. Jeff right, so they are exploring a bunch of Different Things that are not necessarily even alibabas bread and butter. Let alone ecommerce or sports merchandising beyond trying to use the companys troves of data on 500 million shoppers to figure out who should we target as to certain merchandise based on their purchasing histories or whatever based on where they live or whatever. They are going far enough down to the local level to say, well if you bought a tennis racket , somewhere in northern china, that we can send you data on all the stuff you can sign up for online, all the way down to the local level online court times, or coaching, or that kind of thing. Oliver it seems like alibaba has a lot of tools at its disposal to figure this out, but they are battling on uphill sort of an uphill game in which the Chinese Market does not spend a lot on Sporting Goods. It seems like their project is fansrtually sell to sports but that also kind of create sports fans and get people excited about what is happening around them. Jeff it is relative. I mean, the company sold or moved about 76 billion yuan worth of Sporting Goods related merchandise on his platforms worth about 11 billion u. S. So it is not like its nothing but thats about 1 10 the size of the u. S. Market which is a lot smaller people wise. Carol up next President Trump , rethinks his nafta strategy. Oliver and why House Republicans dont like the sanctions bill that is meant to punish the kremlin for hacking the u. S. Election. Carol this is Bloomberg Businessweek. Oliver welcome back to Bloomberg Businessweek. I am oliver renick. Carol i am carla carol massar. You can listen to us on the radio on sirius xm channel 119, 99. 1 fm in washington, d. C. , and am 960 in the bay area. Oliver and in london and in asia on the Bloomberg Radio plus app. Carol in the economics section President Trump is entirely debt , is toning down his antinafta rhetoric. Oliver the white house now thinks tuneup might be the next move. It turns out his plan for nafta is much more moderate than you might expect given what he was saying on the campaign trail, calling it the worst deal ever. Oliver many, many times. Reporter yeah. Heis not just something threw it out once. He kept hammering on the campaign trail. Even after he became president he came within a hairs breadth of just pulling out. He was persuaded not to. So that was a positive sign for people who believed in free trade with canada and mexico. But then the next stage was just this past week when the office of the u. S. Trade representative came out with the objectives the u. S. Will have in talks on renegotiating the pact. And that was something it was required to do. They had to get congress 30 days notice before the talks begin. They will begin midaugust. The plan is kind of modernizing nafta, not gutting it. Carol what happened with your happened . What happened between the campaign trail, and push back, terrible deal, build a wall, whatever to more moderate stance . I have a feeling a lot of people in the Business Community said in open hearings there were like 12,000 comments made on this plan actually free trade benefits the United States. It benefits the people, it benefits the companys, and it would be a shame to throw that away. Oliver any idea what the input has been from our peers in this agreement on what they want . Is there a similar line of sight anywhere . It does look from the reaction to what the Trump Administration put out there are the makings of a deal. There are certain things they are just kind of old and need to be updated. We heard from the converse economy ministers of both canada and mexico that this is a good blueprint for beginning the process of modernization. Oliver House Republicans are voicing objections to a sanctions bill meant to punishing moscow for interfering in the u. S. Election. Carol and it would make it harder for u. S. Companies to do business in russia. Here is editor matthew philip. This is a bill that passed the senate in june 982, the rare bipartisan bill we have seen these days. It basically calls to tighten up existing sanctions regimes on iran but most importantly on russia. Also its an attempt by congress to basically keep the president from being able to ease sanctions on the russian government, either from their meddling in the election or from their incursion into crimea. This is a regime that was put in place in 2014 by the Obama Administration to crack down on russia after their invasion of ukraine. They are trying to tighten those sanctions, but it has run into some problems in the house. On the sanctions and sort of the motivation behind them, sanctions in reaction to the kremlin and russias actions whether it is in crimea, or involvement in the u. S. Elections, i wonder with the idea of keeping the sanctions to prevent the donald Trump Administration from easing those, what kind of language o