Weekly Highlights: Apple Inc. iPhone 6 Plus Dominates, PayPal Goes Solo, Merger Mania & More

As if the Yahoo-AOL and SoftBank-DreamWorks stories weren’t crazy enough, an activist investor has now pushed for SoftBank to acquire Yahoo.

"I think Yahoo and SoftBank is a much better fit than SoftBank and DreamWorks," Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, told Benzinga.

"It makes a lot more sense. With DreamWorks you get kind of a mono-dimensional type of content focused on movies. I don't see any of what I call 'enterprise value' in bringing those together."

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Here’s one way to make investors and analysts happy: Give them what they want.

“I think they had to do it," Rob Enderle, principal analyst at Enderle Group, told Benzinga.

"I think it has to be free to be able to compete with what Apple's doing, what Amazon's doing and the efforts from the credit card companies directly. It just makes sense to separate it so it can operate more freely."

Sean Udall, CIO of Quantum Trading Strategies and author of The TechStrat Report, predicted this development.

"They are spinning out PayPal to create value," he said. "Now Uncle Carl is going to get all the credit, as this was also his activist angle."

Charles Sizemore, a Covestor portfolio manager, had similar remarks.

"It's going to make Carl Icahn happy," Sizemore told Benzinga. "This is what he was agitating for this year and for a while now. It makes sense."

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Microsoft’s next operating system will finally bridge the gap between Windows 8 and Windows 7, which could be significant to enterprise users.

Thomas H. Yorke, managing director of Oceanic Capital Management, told Benzinga that he thinks the new version is a "10."

"The most missed feature of Windows 8, the Start [button], is finally back -- and it looks great," Thomas H. Yorke, managing director of Oceanic Capital Management and a PM on Covestor, told Benzinga.

"An attractive overlay of the favored old-style combined with the customizable tiles of Windows 8. [It's] a blend of old favorites and modern touches, which establishes a seamless integration with all the applications."

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Is Apple’s iPhone 6 Plus more popular than the standard model? That’s hard to say, but a new report indicates that the iPhone 6 Plus assembler has received more IC parts than the assembler for the 4.7-inch iPhone 6.

This does not mean that the iPhone 6 Plus is actually selling more units, but it could indicate that Apple expects it to be the more popular device.

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On October 9, Tesla will unveil a new automobile that is currently known as the Model D.

Nothing else is known about the announcement, but Tigress Financial Partners Chief Investment Officer Ivan Feinseth is among the analysts with a theory.

“I think they’re going to round out to an SUV, a sports car and an entry-level car to have more product choices,” Feinseth told Benzinga.

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It seems that the world’s largest social network can do just about anything.

If the rumors are true, Facebook’s next target is none other than the health care industry. Unfortunately, this might not be the best thing for consumers.

"I think it's a risk of privacy," Wayne State University communications professor Karen McDevitt told Benzinga.

"When it comes to health care, we need to be very careful about whose information it is and in whose hands. We've already seen episodes of breaches of privacy in the health care industry. There are daily occurrences. The results are sometimes minimal, but they can also be quite harmful. I think the fact that we're dealing with health care specifically is cause for concern."

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Is online streaming the future of entertainment? Several companies are betting on its potential. If Netflix has anything to say about it, the format could one day reign supreme.

The transition has been gradual but Netflix achieved a new milestone when it signed comedic actor Adam Sandler to a four-picture deal.

"I think it's a non-event for Sandler, but I think the direction that they're going in is ideal," Brett Golden, president and co-founder of The Chart Lab, told Benzinga.

Not everyone was amused by the agreement.

"It looks like [Chief Content Officer] Ted Sarandos is making the rounds at the Hollywood retirement communities," Albert Fried & Company analyst Rich Tullo told Benzinga.

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The preceding slideshow was just the beginning. Check out these other hot stories right here on Benzinga.

• 7 Suppliers Confirmed To Be In Apple Inc.’s iPhone 6
• How Much Will The iPhone 6 Cost?
• Apple's Improved Upgrade Cycle Could Drive iPhone Sales
• iPhone 6 Image Leak: Real Or Fake?

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