The power behind the throne
It's an easy life, being a business reporter for the BBC, an' no mistake; all you have to do is kick back and drink the corporate koolade. In this case, Natalie Sherman regurgitates Disney CEO, Bob Iger's earnings call release as fact. There may well be some truthful statements in there, but there are also some that are at best half-truths. And we don't have to go very far into the article, either.
According to Disney Sherman: Last year, the board of the company abruptly recalled Mr Iger from retirement and reinstated him as chief executive
. In reality, he didn't retire, at least not properly; he never actually left the building, or even his office for that matter, while at the same time retaining creative control within the company. [Ironically, a CNBC article that recently blew the lid on Iger's shenanigans was written by another less credulous Sherman, Alex.]
Some of Iger's claims could be challenged as spin by anyone with a functioning bullshit detector; and have been by analysts who're more interested in debunking Disney's flim-flam for investors, and are better qualified to do so than I. The point is that, what a company releases at its earnings calls, may not be a wholly unvarnishment statement of fact. You'd think that they'd teach this shit at bizniss jernulizzum skewl, but clearly not. (shrug)
What the BBC really needs is for its crack(head) editorial team to fact-check and verify the information sources used by its urinalists in their reporting. That would be awesome, and it would really lend credence to the corporation's news output. They could call it something like—oh, I dunno—BBC FactCheck.