Financial Markets and Economy
Oil Climbs Above $51 Before Producer Talks as Asian Stocks Swing (Bloomberg)
Crude oil rose a second day, breaching $51 a barrel in New York before a meeting between OPEC and other major producers on output cuts. Asian stocks fluctuated at the end of their best week since September, while bonds and the Korean won declined.
Trump Agenda Could Be Good News for China Exports (Bloomberg)
Donald Trump vowed to get tough with China over trade. The U.S. President-elect’s own economic agenda may add to frustrations as it helps lift the dollar.
Trump Agenda Could Be Good News for China Exports (Bloomberg)
Donald Trump vowed to get tough with China over trade. The U.S. President-elect’s own economic agenda may add to frustrations as it helps lift the dollar.
Stock benchmarks just did something they haven’t done in nearly 20 years (Market Watch)
Five major U.S. stock-index benchmarks finished at records on the same day—something that hasn’t happened in more than 18 years, according to Dow Jones data.
Japan's Money Market Shows Signs of Life (Bloomberg)
In a development that marks a win for Bank of Japan policy makers anxious to preserve a key cog of the financial system, the volume of interbank loans is recovering following a sharp pullback in the aftermath of the introduction of a negative rate on a portion of banks’ reserves.
The US is $19.9 trillion in debt — here are the countries we owe the most (Business Insider)
The Unites States has a massive monetary debt to the world, with China being one of the countries we owe the most.
OPEC Deal Raises Hopes But Not Valuations for Troubled Oil Producers (The Wall Street Journal)
OPEC’s deal to cut oil production isn’t likely to save investors in troubled U.S. producers from seeing their stakes vanish in chapter 11, according to restructuring experts.
Emerging-Market Stocks Rise on ECB Signals; Currencies Mixed (Bloomberg)
Emerging-market stocks rallied the most in a month as the European Central Bank signaled it stood ready to add to stimulus after a decision to cut its monthly pace of bond buying.
Jump in Oil Prices Makes Lending Ecuador $750 Million a Bit More Appealing (Bloomberg)
Ecuador, OPEC’s smallest member, sold $750 million of 10-year bonds to yield 9.65 percent, two days after Mexico’s state oil company saw more than $30 billion of bids for the $5.5 billion of notes it was selling.
U.S. Household Net Worth Reached Record $90.2 Trillion in Third Quarter (The Wall Street Journal)
The wealth of U.S. households climbed to a record $90.2 trillion in the third quarter, driven by a powerful buildup in both real estate and stocks.
Trump sold stocks, but what about his hedge fund millions? (CNN Money)
He sold all of them in June, he says, because he was worried about conflicts of interest.
Mexico’s Peso Problems Are a Warning Sign for Global Investors (Bloomberg)
The world has never been so invested in Mexico, and so Mexico has never posed a bigger potential threat to the world.
Economists Doubt the U.S. Can Regain Many of the Factory Jobs Lost in Recent Decades (The Wall Street Journal)
After hitting a record of nearly 20 million in 1979, the number of American factory workers has plunged during each of the last five recessions and each time has never recovered. Today, 12.3 million people are employed in U.S. factories, a loss of nearly eight million jobs.
Nigeria Looks to Farming as Oil Boom Fades and Hunger Sets In (Bloomberg)
Nigeria is turning to farming as dwindling oil income has driven the economy to the brink of its first full-year contraction in more than two decades and more people go hungry.
China Factory Prices Jump 3.3%, Lifting Global Inflation Outlook (Bloomberg)
China’s factory-gate inflation rose to the highest since late 2011, helping to sustain prices around the world. Consumer prices picked up on rising food costs.
Wall Street’s Old, Unwanted Bond Salesmen Find a Home in Chicago (Bloomberg)
After a quarter-century at Morgan Stanley, Main — like countless old-school types who came of age in the ’80s — was kicked to the curb as banks turn to youth and technology in the face of tighter regulation and lower profits.
U.S. Loses Billions by Wasting Immigrant Talent (Bloomberg)
The world’s largest economy is losing billions of dollars every year by having immigrant doctors drive taxis and engineers wait tables.
Companies
Shares in the all-electric automaker tend to be volatile, and on Wall Street there's a chasm between the bulls and the bears as far as price-targets go. Some have seen the stock plunging below $100, while others have argued that it could touch $500.
Wells Fargo Ex-Managers’ Suit Puts Scandal Blame Higher Up Chain (Bloomberg)
The lawsuits piling up against Wells Fargo & Co. over its fake accounts scandal have expanded to include three former branch managers alleging that an area president ordered employees to open bogus accounts to juice sales.
Time Inc. Hires Banks to Help Field Takeover, Partnership Interest (The Wall Street Journal)
Time Inc. hired banks to help field takeover or partnership interest after the country’s largest magazine publisher received overtures from a group of media investors including Edgar Bronfman Jr.
Technology
The secretive startup called Magic Leap is working on a pair of glasses that will impose images and interactive video onto the real world. But it may have implied that its products will be more spectacular than they really will be when the first generation start shipping sometime next year, former employees have told The Information's Reed Albergotti.
BlackBerry Rebrands Security Software After Acquisition Splurge (Bloomberg)
BlackBerry Ltd. rebranded the software products it acquired over the last three years, tying them together into a single system it hopes will be the go-to platform companies and governments use to protect their electronic devices from hacks.
Secret's anonymous sharing app is now a publishing platform (Engadget)
Remember Secret? The standard bearer for the anonymous social app movement shuttered in 2015 before co-creator David Byttow teased a possible Version 2 in the wake of Donald Trump's election.
The Best Eco-Friendly Superyachts, Toys and Tenders to Help Save the Planet (Forbes)
Advances of green technology in the marine industry are creating a massive wave of new designs and plans for the future of boating. Green yachts and products will quickly become the most sought after element in the industry.
Real Robots Fight A Virtual War in Your Living Room (Bloomberg)
The 25-year-old Nigerian-born chief executive officer of Reach Robotics may be on the cusp of creating the next big craze, if the first impression of his MekaMon robots is any indication.
Politics
OBAMA: There are folks whose 'primary concern' about me is 'that I seem foreign' (Business Insider)
Barack Obama spoke candidly about his treatment as the first black president in an interview that aired on CNN on Wednesday evening.
South Korean President Faces Impeachment Vote Amid Corruption Scandal (AP, TIME)
South Korean President Park Geun-hye entered what could be her last day in power Friday, as lawmakers geared up for what’s widely expected to be a successful impeachment vote amid a corruption scandal that has left her isolated and loathed.
These Super PAC Donors Were Able To Hide Their Identities Before The Election (The Huffington Post)
In the final days of the 2016 election, there was concern among Democrats that voters in Philadelphia wouldn’t be able to get to their polling locations due to a transit workers strike.
Trump labor secretary pick Andy Puzder talked about replacing workers with robots (Market Watch)
President-elect Donald Trump’s potential pick for labor secretary, Andy Puzder, has talked up the benefits of replacing real human workers with technology.
Clinton decries fake news 'epidemic' (Politico)
Hillary Clinton on Thursday called for a bipartisan fight against an "epidemic" of fake news, sounding the alarm one month after she lost an election buffeted by the public spread of misinformation.
Life on the Home Planet
In fossil rarity, tumor found in 255-million-year-old beast (Reuters)
Scientists examining the jawbone of a saber-toothed, mammal-like beast that prowled Tanzania 255 million years ago have come across a remarkable fossil rarity: one of the oldest-known tumors.
Vietnam dredges reef disputed with China (The Guardian)
Vietnam has begun dredging work on a disputed reef in the South China Sea, satellite imagery shows, the latest move by the communist state to bolster its claims in the strategically important waterway.
One of the rarest crystals on Earth has been found in a Russian meteorite (Science Alert)
Physicists have uncovered an ultra-rare quasicrystal in a piece of Russian meteorite, and it’s only the third time ever that we’ve seen one of these strange materials in nature.
