Hello and welcome to the longest day of the year. Enjoy every moment of the 15 hours, 5 minutes, and 38 seconds of daylight if you're in New York — if you're in Anchorage, Alaska, though, you're getting a whopping 19 hours and 21 minutes. Today we're exploring: |
- Bussin': The LA Lakers could be sold for $10 billion.
- Hot spots: Europeans are biting back against tourism.
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The Lakers could be sold at a record $10 billion valuation |
In February, the Los Angeles Lakers shocked the world, acquiring star Luka Doncic in a blockbuster three-team deal — a moment so shocking that many basketball fans can still remember where they were when they heard the news. This week, the team itself is the subject of a major swap. On Wednesday, ESPN reported that the Buss family, who have owned the Los Angeles Lakers for over 45 years, would be selling the NBA titans to Guggenheim chief and serial sports investor Mark Walter in a deal that would value the franchise at $10 billion. |
Though the bumper price tag reflects the Lakers' historic pedigree — they've won more championships (11) than any other team since the Buss dynasty took over — and global fame, it's just the latest in a growing line of megadeals in the NBA. In the last two years alone, five other basketball teams in the US have switched hands for over $3 billion apiece, and it's not just basketball; the nation's biggest franchises in other sports also dominate the most expensive sports deals of all time. |
With the surprise Lakers sale and the Boston Celtics fetching a record-breaking-at-the-time $6.1 billion earlier this year, American basketball teams now account for 6 of the 10 most expensive sports franchise deals ever. Per figures from the BBC, UK soccer side Chelsea FC is the only franchise from outside the US to break the top 10. You can be sure that the owners of other major NBA franchises are putting the feelers out this weekend to see if anyone else wants to pay an 11-figure sum for their team. Of course, not every team has Lebron and Luka. |
Europeans hit back against overtourism |
On Sunday, a string of planned overtourism protests took place across some of Europe's most beloved tourist destinations — with locals in popular southern European cities and islands rallying against the swaths of summer travelers that descend on their neighborhoods. As reported by The New York Times, residents in Barcelona sprayed tourists with water guns; protestors in Lisbon carried an effigy of the city's patron saint to the planned site of a new hotel; people in Genoa rolled suitcases through the streets in what they called a "noisy stroll." One day later, staff at the Louvre, which sees ~20,000 people visit just the room where the Mona Lisa is kept every single day, went on an impromptu strike against overcrowding. |
The protesters might have a point. Indeed, Europe recorded ~747 million international tourist arrivals in 2024, per the UN, while data from Eurostat shows that last year was the biggest tourism summer on record for the EU, with August alone recording 494 million tourism nights, up 16% from the same month a decade prior. The countries that saw the highest number of nights spent in EU tourist accommodation were Spain (~500 million), Italy (~458 million), and France (~451 million). |
In some of the most popular destinations, authorities are taking heed. Daytrippers to Venice now face higher tourism taxes, Greece is limiting visitor numbers to the Acropolis, and Spain continues to clamp down on unlicensed short-term accommodation rentals — much to Airbnb's chagrin. But will the protests be enough to deter Europhiles from visiting? Unlikely. Summer travel from the US to Europe is forecast to increase 10% this year. |
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- Shorts go long: YouTube Shorts is now pulling in 200 billion daily views, up nearly 3x from last year.
- The US minted over 1,000 new millionaires every day last year, bringing the total to 23.8 million — the most of any country, per a new UBS report.
- A(I)nxiety: Google's latest AI model, Gemini 2.5 Pro, was caught in "panic" mode during a rocky Pokémon playthrough.
- Young Americans are now planning to have just 1.8 kids on average, down from 2.3 in 2012, according to Pew Research Center.
- SpaceX's Starship rocket exploded during a ground test on Wednesday, marking its fourth failure in a row. Elsewhere in Elon Musk's empire, Tesla's robotaxi service is launching with 10 to 20 cars in Austin this weekend with 10 to 20 cars.
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- How many weekly working hours does it take to escape poverty in each country?
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Off the charts: Amazon is deepening its ties with Whole Foods as it tries to catch up to its rivals in the grocery game — but how many of the 5 largest grocery stores can you name? [Answer below]. |
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