WSJ What’s News - Meta Defeats Government Antitrust Case

Episode Date: November 18, 2025

P.M. Edition for Nov. 18. A federal judge has dismissed the Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust case against Meta Platforms, which alleged that the company has a social-media monopoly. We hear from WSJ tech reporter Meghan Bobrowsky about what that means for Meta. Plus, President Trump said that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ”knew nothing about” the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, rejecting a CIA assessment at the time. Plus, the House has passed a bill to release government files related to Jeffrey Epstein. Alex Ossola hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A federal judge dismisses the government's antitrust case against MEDA. Plus, President Trump says Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman knew nothing about the 2018 murder of Jamal Khashoggi. You're mentioning somebody that was extremely controversial. A lot of people didn't like that gentleman that you're talking about. Whether you like him or didn't like him, things happened. But he knew nothing about it. And the House votes to release government files about Jeffrey Epstein. It's Tuesday, November 18th.

I'm Alex O'Sullough for the Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today. A federal judge has dismissed the Federal Trade Commission's antitrust case against META platforms. The FTC filed its suit in 2020, dating back to the first Trump administration, claiming that META operated as a monopoly after its acquisition, of Instagram and WhatsApp, and that the Facebook owner's products don't compete with TikTok and YouTube. The judge's dismissal of the case deals a blow to one of the government's

marquee antitrust lawsuits against big technology companies. WSJ reporter Megan Babroski joins me now to discuss the case and its implications. Megan, I want to start by talking about meta. What does this dismissal mean for the company and what it can do? Yeah, so this is basically best case scenario for meta. There are no restrictions. They don't have to do anything or change anything, they can just keep operating as normal. And where it is a big win for them is they can continue to pursue their huge AI buildout without any restrictions coming from this litigation. One of the key points of this case seems to have been past actions versus present status. What does this case show about how the tech world has changed? This tells you

how slowly litigation moves. This case was filed years ago. by the time that it actually got to court, Meta was in a very different place and now it has a lot of other competitors. Well, that's what they argued, right? YouTube, TikTok. What Neta's products are used for involved quite drastically

over the time that this case was brought to the point where they were actually making the argument in court that people don't connect with their friends and family on its apps, which is kind of different from an argument they might have been making five years ago. The judge ultimately agreed with META that the FTC did not prove that the current conditions that META is operating in are a monopoly. That was Wall Street Journal reporter, Megan Babraski. Thanks, Megan.

Thanks for having me. In Washington, during a meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman or MBS at the White House today, President Trump said that MBS quote, knew nothing about the 2018 murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, even though the CIA concluded at the time that the royal had ordered his killing. Here's Trump speaking in the Oval Office today, answering a reporter question about Khashoggi. You're mentioning somebody that was extremely controversial. A lot of people didn't like that gentleman that you're talking about, whether you like him or didn't like him. Things happened, but he knew nothing about it. MBS added that, quote, it's really painful to hear anyone losing

his life for no real purpose or not in a legal way. He says his country conducted an investigation to ensure nothing like the assassination happens again. Kishoggi was a Saudi dissident and U.S. resident who repeatedly spoke out against the kingdom's repressive regime. His grisly murder in a Saudi consulate in Turkey led to intense blowback in Washington, with members of both parties calling for the U.S. to break ties with the kingdom. Also today, MBS said his country would look to invest $1 trillion in the U.S. economy. While Trump brushed a side questions about his family's business ties to Saudi Arabia. And on Capitol Hill, the House has passed a bill that would require the Justice Department

to release government files related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The vote was almost unanimous with just one vote against Republican Louisiana Representative Clay Higgins. It's a milestone in the long-running fight that has divided Republicans. Trump blasted the effort for months, calling it a Democratic-driven campaign to embarrass Republicans and distract from GOP policy wins. But as it became clear that dozens of Republicans were likely to break ranks and support the measure to force the Justice Department to release documents,

Trump reversed course. He said he supported the passage of the bill and would sign it into law if it got to his desk, while continuing to call it a hoax. The measure now goes to the Senate, which could vote as soon as this evening. In other political news, a federal court has blocked a new Texas congressional map that was designed to add as many as five new Republican House seats ahead of next year's midterm elections. The court ordered that the midterm races use districts drawn in 2021.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott says the state will appeal the order to the U.S. Supreme Court. Coming up, what Latin America's political turn to the right means for its relationship with the U.S. and China. That's after the break. U.S. markets. dropped for a fourth straight session, with the Dow tumbling 1.1 percent, and the S&P ending down about 0.8%. Home Depot's latest earnings report dragged on the Dow. Home Depot said profit fell in the third quarter and cut its outlook for the year. Economic uncertainty, high interest rates, and a stagnant housing market are making homeowners delay remodeling projects. Home Depot stock

fell 6 percent today. And worries about tech valuations weighed on tech stocks, with the NASDAQ dropping 1.2%. WSJ Markets reporter David Uberti says investors are still jittery about whether all this investment in AI will pay off. It's continued trepidation among investors that the AI boom that has propelled markets and to some extent the U.S. economy this year is potentially running out of steam. And there's a lot of cross currents that go beneath that. This could be investors taking profits from what has been a really, really great market

in recent months. But it could also be people trimming their. bets in the lead-up to NVIDIA's earnings. David says NVIDIA is seen as the linchpin for the entire AI boom, and people see it as a barometer for what comes next. NVIDIA reports after the closing bell tomorrow. He says that will give investors more clarity, along with a delayed government report on September U.S. jobs that comes out on Thursday.

So those things in concert will answer two key questions in investors' minds. First and foremost, is the AI boom running out of steam to some respect? And secondly, is the broader economy around which this AI boom is happening, is that slowing as slowly as we thought it was before the government shut down. An index that tracks chip stocks fell into correction territory this morning. But David says the broader market is still a ways off. So a correction is typically seen as a 10% drawdown from a recent high. In broader indexes, we've gotten about halfway there, more or less, at various points earlier this morning. That said, if you look at specific names within AI broadly, some important players have reached that level, if not exceeded it.

InVIDIA at one point earlier today was something like 9% in change down from its recent high Oracle, core weave. They have fallen even further in recent weeks. So you really see this situation emerging where investors are parsing a little bit more closely who will be the winners and losers in this fight. And to this point, it's really unclear. And speaking of AI, Invidia and Microsoft said today that they will invest up to $15 billion in Anthropic, a competitor to open AI.

Anthropic, meanwhile, is purchasing $30 billion in computing capacity from Microsoft's cloud computing business Azure, which runs on NVIDIA's AI systems. Polish officials say Russia is behind a Saturday explosion on the Polish rail network. They say two Ukrainian men collaborated with Russia, security services to carry out the attack, which almost caused a pack commuter train to veer off the tracks. Western officials say Russia is seeking to destabilize NATO members

through covert acts of sabotage. The Kremlin has denied any involvement in acts of sabotage in Europe. And airlines and jet engine makers are deploying new measures to curb instances of toxic fumes leaking into cockpits and cabins. The efforts follow a Wall Street Journal report in September that leaks of oil and other aircraft fluids into engines, have surged in recent years. The first round of presidential elections in Chile show that conservative leaders are the ones getting heavy support. Recent elections in Argentina and Bolivia

also show that voters are backing conservative ideas across Latin America. For more on what's driving that right-word turn, I'm joined now by WSJ reporter, Samantha Pearson, who's based in Brazil. Samantha, why are conservative ideas resonating with Latin Americans? What are some of the issues that they're worried about? One of the main reasons is crime, street violence. We've seen the rise of organized crime generally over South America. People are worried about how this trickles down into everyday life.

So it's things like cell phone theft or getting robbed at a gas station. I would say that's the number one driver of this right-wing sentiment across the region. There's obviously other themes. People are fed up with all the Venezuelan immigrants arriving across the region. The economy is an important topic as well. After many years of recession or poor economic growth, a lot of voters are ready to vote for a more business-friendly candidate. What does this mean for these countries' relationships with the U.S.?

So this actually provides a great opportunity for Washington right now. For the past 20 years or so, people here would say that Washington has more or less ignored South America as they've focused on conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere. We've seen unprecedented interest from Trump specifically. he's made it clear that he's going to be very active in the region, so he's focused on combating organized crime, immigration, but also Latin America and South America specifically is a very mineral-rich region. Huge copper deposits here, rare earths, lithium. So really

cultivating friendly governments in the region is key for the future of the US economy and efforts to modernise. These minerals are used in everything from electric cars, the defence technology, So it's really vital for the U.S. economy as well. And what does it mean for these nations' relationships with China? So China's really had a head start. They've been extremely active in terms of signing trade deals, investing, also offering finance. There's a joke in South America that the Americans come to give lectures and sermon, and then the Chinese come to build.

And so it's obviously hard to reverse that. And it puts these governments in a tricky position because they do need to. China. Brazil, for example, it sells a lot of its commodities to China. It needs that money for investment in infrastructure still. So the key for these countries is kind of going to be walking that line between still doing business with China, but also pleasing Washington. So in theory, we could see Latin American countries pulling out of projects that really anger Washington. But I don't think Washington's going to be able to boot China out of South America. That was Wall Street Journal reporter Samantha Pearson. Thanks, Samantha. Thank you. And that's what's news for this Tuesday afternoon.

Today's show is produced by Pierre Biennameh and Zoe Colkin with supervising producer Tali Arbell. I'm Alex Oscella for the Wall Street Journal. We'll be back with a new show tomorrow morning. Thanks for listening.