Good morning. Meta Platforms has challenged the constitutionality of the Federal Trade Commission’s structure, the company’s latest effort to block the regulator from imposing new restrictions on how it can monetize user data.

Meta—which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp—sued the FTC in federal court in Washington, alleging “fundamental aspects of the Commission’s structure violate the U.S. Constitution.” Meta is seeking an injunction blocking the FTC from moving forward with new restrictions on the company.

• Due-process violation?  Taking issue with the FTC’s use of its in-house courts, Meta argues that in these proceedings the regulator “has a dual role as prosecutor and judge” in violation of due-process guarantees. Meta is seeking an injunction blocking the FTC from moving forward with new restrictions on the company.
   
• Past challenge: The argument Meta makes in its latest lawsuit was foreshadowed in an April decision by the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court said people and businesses subjected to FTC administrative proceedings can seek to enjoin, or block, those proceedings by suing in U.S. District Court and raising constitutional arguments there.
   
• SCOTUS skepticism: The Supreme Court’s conservative majority has shown skepticism toward the use of administrative courts within federal agencies. During oral arguments in a different case on Wednesday, the justices appeared ready to scale back the Securities and Exchange Commission’s power to enforce securities laws through administrative hearings rather than jury trials.

Finra fines BofA Securities $24 million for Treasurys spoofing.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority fined BofA Securities $24 million for more than 700 instances of spoofing through two former traders. The company, Bank of America’s broker-dealer subsidiary, consented to the entry of Finra’s findings without admitting or denying the charges in settling the matter, Finra said.

Finra pointed to what it said were deficiencies in the supervisory systems that BofA Securities had in place. Systems set up by the broker-dealer to supervise trading were only designed to detect spoofing when it was done by an algorithm, and not manual spoofing done by a human trader. They also weren’t set up to detect certain orders traders entered through systems provided by third parties, Finra said.

PwC’s China and Hong Kong units fined in training exam cheating probe.

The Public Company Accounting Oversight Board fined PricewaterhouseCoopers’s China and Hong Kong units over training exam misconduct from hundreds of employees as part of its first set of enforcement settlements with audit firms in the region since it gained full access to inspect them late last year.

PwC Hong Kong and PwC China agreed to pay a combined $7 million to settle claims that they failed to detect or prevent extensive and improper answer-sharing on tests for mandatory internal training courses, the U.S. auditing watchdog said Thursday.

• The Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday charged Jonathan Larmore, a Phoenix-based real-estate investor, with stock manipulation tied to a false tender offer for now-bankrupt WeWork.
   
• Penguin Random House has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block school book banning in Iowa, the latest effort by publishers, authors and teachers to counter the removal of works from school classrooms and libraries.
   
• Three co-founders of defunct investment firm StraightPath Venture Partners face criminal fraud charges related to the way they pitched investments in “pre-IPO” shares.

Consumers pulled back on spending, inflation eased in October.

Americans slowed their spending in October and inflation continued cooling as the economy downshifted into fall after a fast-paced summer.

The combination of ebbing income growth, high interest rates and prices, dwindling pandemic savings and the resumption of student-loan payments is eroding Americans’ ability to keep boosting their spending as briskly as they did through the summer, economists say. Inflation has cooled markedly this year, likely bringing the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate increases to an end.

• Investing in China has never been this perilous. When global investors flocked to the country during its economic boom in the past decade, geopolitical risks were at the back of their minds. Such risks are now a top consideration for buyers of Chinese stocks, bonds and stakes in private companies—and are turning many people off investing in China.
   
• Finance chiefs are anticipating more pain from foreign exchange rates after the U.S. dollar strengthened again this summer and fall, following a historic tear last year.
   
• OPEC+ agreed to a significant production cut of an additional million barrels a day, delegates said, in a move that will likely keep prices elevated amid the continuing conflict in the Middle East.

• Retailers have reined in inventory ahead of the holiday season as they try to get a better handle on volatile consumer demand.
   
• A law designed to protect patients from surprise medical bills is denting the finances of some healthcare providers, with a few major ones filing for bankruptcy.
   
• Okta's disclosure that a data breach was far larger than previously thought highlights the difficulties companies face with SEC cyber rules set to go live in December.
   
• 🎧 Listen to Dave Stangis, Apollo Global Management's first chief sustainability officer, discuss how he builds teams focused on sustainability.

• Retailers are turning to artificial intelligence technology to better predict shopper demand and repair supply chains whipsawed by volatile consumer buying patterns during the pandemic.
   
• U.S. stocks recorded their best month in more than a year.
   
• Activist investor Nelson Peltz announced a new proxy fight against Disney after the company rebuffed his request to be added to the board, starting the latest phase in the battle for the entertainment giant’s future.
   
• Russian soldiers captured by Ukrainian troops in the battle for Avdiivka told of the high price their army is incurring for its grinding advance.
   
• McDonald's has decided it’s had enough with dry patties and squishy buns.

Follow us on X at @WSJRisk. Follow Risk & Compliance editor David Smagalla @DSmagalla_DJ and reporters Mengqi Sun @_MengqiSun, Dylan Tokar @dgtokar and Richard Vanderford @VanderfordRich.

You can reach us by replying to any newsletter, or email David at david.smagalla@wsj.com.