Financial Markets and Economy
Wall Street little changed; Dow still flirting with 20,000 (Reuters)
U.S. stocks opened little changed on Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average still flirting with the elusive 20,000 mark, a day after both it and the Nasdaq Composite hit record highs.
Saudi Arabia Plans Payouts to Offset Subsidy Cuts in 2017 (Bloomberg)
Saudi Arabia is weighing plans to raise retail fuel prices again next year and will start a cash-transfer program to compensate all but the wealthiest for cuts in universal subsidies as it pursues an unprecedented plan to overhaul the economy.
U.K. November Borrowing Leaves Hammond on Track to Meet Forecast (Bloomberg)
Britain’s budget deficit narrowed marginally in November, leaving Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond on course to meet his new full-year borrowing target.
European stocks pull back from 2016 high, with banks losing ground (Market Watch)
European stocks slipped Wednesday, but hovered around their highest level of the year, with investors assessing developments surrounding embattled Italian lender Banca Monte dei Paschi, as well fines against some European lenders by a Swiss regulator.
Treasury yields inch lower as investors lose appetite for risky assets (Market Watch)
The yield on the 10-year Treasury TMUBMUSD10Y, -0.36% fell 0.7 basis point to 2.553%, while the two-year yield TMUBMUSD02Y, -1.32% was marginally lower at 1.213%. The yield on the 30-year bond TMUBMUSD30Y, -0.06% shed half a basis point to 3.137%.
Pound Options Show Pessimism With Bearish Bets at 7-Week High (Bloomberg)
Pound traders are becoming increasingly bearish on the currency, with the cost of insurance against a decline versus the dollar at the highest since November.
Big Banks Are Stocking Up on Blockchain Patents (Bloomberg)
In the headlong rush to revolutionize modern finance, blockchain enthusiasts are overlooking one potentially costly problem: their applications, built on open-source code, may actually belong to someone else.
Bank Mergers Spread in Mideast as Low Oil Signals Boom Days Over (Bloomberg)
Oil’s more than 50 percent plunge over the past two years is forcing countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to cut state spending, tap reserves and combine some of their largest banks to reduce costs and duplication.
A Quick Look at What’s in Store for U.K. Stock Markets in 2017 (Bloomberg)
While the FTSE 100 Index is among the developed world’s top performers in 2016, its showing relative to Europe has been less impressive since investors turned bullish on global growth. About a third of the gauge is composed of health care and consumer staples, which are typically deemed more immune to economic cycles.
U.K. Companies Plan 2017 Price Hikes as Pound Drop Lifts Costs (Bloomberg)
U.K. companies are more likely to hike prices next year rather than absorb the impact of higher import costs caused by the Brexit-induced drop in the pound.
Shares in the world's oldest bank are recovering as a bailout moves closer (Business Insider)
Shares in Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena crashed in early trading Wednesday after the bank warned over its ability to meet its day-to-day expenses.
What Do Investors Need To Understand About Venezuela's Economic Crisis? (Forbes)
Venezuela is far and away the worst-managed economy in the Americas. Advocates of unbridled populism and protectionism should take the time to look at Venezuela (and Brazil and Argentina) as examples of the path best left un-taken.
The price of bitcoin is at a 2016 high (Business Insider)
The price of cryptocurrency bitcoin has passed its 2016 peak in recent days, with some market commentators taking it as a sign of fears about global growth in 2017.
10 things you need to know before the opening bell (Business Insider)
The Dow is getting closer to 20,000. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.5% on Tuesday, finishing at 19,974.62. It's expected to open little changed on Wednesday.
Companies
Accenture Tops Views, But Lowers Earnings Guidance (The Wall Street Journal)
Accenture PLC’s profit grew 22% for the fiscal first quarter amid strong top-line growth, though the consultancy lowered its guidance for the year on foreign-exchange challenges.
Coke to Buy AB InBev’s Stake in African Bottling Business for $3.15 Billion (The Wall Street Journal)
Coca-Cola Co. has agreed to buy a 54.5% stake in Coca-Cola Beverages Africa, the soft-drink company’s largest African bottling business, from Anheuser-Busch InBev SA for $3.15 billion.
Technology
Twitter is failing as a public company, but there are other ways to keep this bird aloft (Quartz)
2016 has been a year of surprises and painful lessons that have taught us we must proactively defend what we value or face losing it in spectacular fashion. In 2017, Twitter’s future might matter more than you might think—and it hinges on keeping it in the hands (or, should we say, thumbs) of the public.
Google Employee Sues Company Over 'Spying Program' (Newsweek)
The lawsuit, filed by an anonymous product manager, alleges that illegal confidentiality agreements, policies and practices mean it fails to live up to its motto “don’t be evil.”
How GPS data derived from e-taxi platforms could improve road conditions in developing countries (Venture Beat)
A new initiative that uses GPS data derived from drivers on a number of e-taxi services has launched this week with a long-term view of improving transport services and easing traffic congestion around the world.
Volvo reintroduces super-reflective LifePaint for winter solstice (Roadshow)
When faced with the longest night of the year, cyclists need all the help they can get. That's why Volvo brought back a novel method of staying safe just in time for the winter solstice.
Why Smartphone Virtual Assistants Will Be Taking Over for Your Apps Soon (Fortune)
Right now, smartphone owners use Siri, Cortana, and Google Now at least sporadically to verbally request directions, send texts, get information, or control their devices. But that practice will become much more common over the next four years, according to a new survey by IT research firm Gartner.
Prostate cancer laser treatment cures half of trial subjects (Engadget)
A new prostate cancer treatment that combines lasers and deep-sea bacteria could be "truly transformative," according to a team of researchers. A trial conducted with 415 men across Europe finished with nearly half completely free of cancer compared to 13.5 percent in a control group To top it off, unlike with current, aggressive therapies that can cause impotence and urinary problems, most of the subjects were free of side effects after two years.
No-one knows what smartwatches are for and they don't want to buy them (Business Insider)
The smartwatch hype is over, and they're totally failing to live up to analysts' expectations.
eMarketer, a research firm, is slashing its estimates of people using wearable technology. Just 39.5 million American adults used a wearable at least monthly in 2015, it estimates — versus its previous forecast for the year of 63.7 million.
Blu's Life Max Phone Promises Up To Three Days Of 'Standard Usage' For Less Than $120 (Digital Trends)
In terms of design, the Life Max is similar to the Galaxy Note 4 in that both have metal borders and faux leather back covers, along with faux leather stitching on the back. Meeting that metallic border is the Life Max’s 5.5-inch, 1,280 x 720 pixel resolution IPS display that curves at the edges, with a 5-megapixel camera with flash above it and an 8MP sensor around back.
Politics
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What Nietzsche's philosophy can tell us about why Brexit and Trump won (Vox)
Normally, a book about Nietzsche’s political theory would not be of interest to general audiences, but against the backdrop of Brexit and Donald Trump, I suspect it will be.
Trump team discussing ‘half-blind’ trust for conflicts of interest (Politico)
Donald Trump’s aides are considering a business arrangement that critics say would allow him or his appointees to sidestep conflict-of-interest laws governing the incoming administration and large investments in private-sector business.
Here’s The Law That Poses The Greatest Threat To Donald Trump (The Huffington Post)
WASHINGTON – By walking onto the inaugural platform outside the Capitol and putting his hand on a Bible on Jan. 20, Donald Trump may be stepping closer to committing a felony than he ever imagined when he launched his unlikely bid to become the nation’s 45th president.
RAY DALIO: Get Ready For Trump To Kick "Weak, Unproductive" Socialists Out Of Washington (Vanity Fair Hive)
Billionaire Ray Dalio is the founder of Bridgewater Associates, one of the world’s most successful hedge funds, with about $160 billion in assets under management. At the firm, a large group of employees is tasked with “studying the impact of geopolitical events on the economy” and publishing “a daily research note for clients . . . with its assessment of macroeconomic trends and the impact on the markets.”
Obama’s move to stop arctic drilling forever could thwart Donald Trump’s oil ambitions (Quartz)
In his last days in office Barack Obama, the outgoing president of the United States, is trying to block his successor, Donald Trump, from overturning attempts to protect the climate.
Japan to bolster coastguard amid island dispute with China (Reuters)
Japan will step up efforts to bolster its coastguard as a territorial dispute with China over a group of East China Sea islets shows no signs of abating, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Wednesday.
Donald Trump was officially elected the 45th US president when the Electoral College met Monday, despite having lost the popular vote to his Democratic challenger, Hillary Clinton, by more than 2.9 million votes.
Trump’s Cabinet Choices: Aggression is Hard to Play Against (The Huffington Post)
President-elect Donald Trump has now announced almost all of his choices for Cabinet positions. By any definition, many of his choices are much more aggressive than those of his predecessors. There are few “safe” or “compromise” picks among the appointees,. Many, if not most, of Trump’s choices would be expected to draw fire and risk rejection if they had been proposed by the last several Presidents.
Health and Biotech
Do humans need dairy? Here’s the science (The Conversation)
A lot of people will have already made up their mind about whether humans need dairy in their diet and will be thinking that the answer is obviously “yes” or obviously “no”. But nutrition is based on science not opinion – so, here’s the latest research on the matter.
Life on the Home Planet
France checks on security at Christmas markets after Berlin attack (Reuters)
A government spokesman said organisers of Christmas markets had been contacted to verify all security measures, including baggage checks, in the light of Monday's Berlin attack when a truck careered into a market killing 12 people.
Residents of China's capital getting out of town to escape smog (Reuters)
Residents of China's capital were wearing face masks and using air purifiers to try to avoid heavy pollution blanketing the city for a fifth day on Wednesday, but others were giving up the fight and joining a rush of "smog avoidance" travel.
Evacuation of civilians from east Aleppo resumes after a day: U.N. (Reuters)
Buses loaded with Syrian civilians have begun leaving the last rebel-held enclave of eastern Aleppo again on Wednesday, after being stalled for a day, a U.N. official said.
What it's really like to live in one of the cities with the best quality of life in the world (Business Insider)
Ever since Britain voted to leave the European Union in June this year, a number of Brits who voted Remain have said they are looking move somewhere in Europe.
Come to Florida for the Sun, Stay for the Invasive Species (Scientific American)
Home of Hurricanes. The Invasive Species State. Land of the Rising Sea. Live Free or Die in a Sinkhole. Any of these phrases could proudly serve as the officially legislated nickname for Florida.
HUMOR
Horrible Facebook Algorithm Accident Results In Exposure To New Ideas (The Onion)
MENLO PARK, CA—Assuring users that the company’s entire team of engineers was working hard to make sure a glitch like this never happens again, Facebook executives confirmed during a press conference Tuesday that a horrible accident last night involving the website’s algorithm had resulted in thousands of users being exposed to new concepts.
