Written by Gary
Uncertainty remains with investors about the US-China phase one agreement (SPY +0.1%) posting modest gains in another tight-ranged session.
Here is the current market situation from CNN Money | |
 | North and South American markets are higher today with shares in Mexico leading the region. The IPC is up 0.78% while Brazil’s Bovespa is up 0.40% and U.S.’s S&P 500 is up 0.05%. |
What Is Moving the Markets
| Here are the headlines moving the markets. | |
| Peruvian prosecutor investigating deaths of two McDonald’s employeesA Peruvian prosecutor’s office said it was investigating the death of two teenaged employees in a McDonald’s-branded restaurant in Lima, in an incident that has spurred protests against the fast-food giant in the South American nation. |
| Despite IPO flameouts, 2019 sets record for U.S. unicorn birthsUnicorns like Uber, Lyft and Slack may have had disappointing IPOs, but U.S. venture capital firms gave birth to a record number of unicorns in 2019. |
| Indian tribunal backs Mistry’s reinstatement as chairman of Tata SonsCyrus Mistry, who has been embroiled in a legal battle with Tata Group since being ousted in 2016, won backing from a tribunal to be reinstated as executive chairman of its holding company, lawyers said on Wednesday. |
| Dollar gains on Fed rates view; stocks edge higherThe dollar gained on Wednesday as improving economic data squashed the likelihood of a Federal Reserve interest rate cut in 2020, while global equity markets extended a rally that again pushed key indices on Wall Street to record highs. |
| Airbus sees strong sales haul this year on Asia demand, long-range A321Airbus is on course to end 2019 with a rise in its order backlog after netting more sales than deliveries across its major products, a senior executive said on Wednesday, thanks partly to strong demand in Asia. |
| Daimler agrees to $20 million settlement over U.S. vehicle recallsDaimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz USA has agreed to a $20 million civil penalty over its handling of U.S. vehicle recalls after a year-long U.S. government investigation into 1.4 million recalled vehicles. |
| Saturday before Christmas expected to be the biggest U.S. shopping day of 2019U.S. retailers are expected to ring up record sales on Super Saturday this year, as fewer days than usual between Thanksgiving and Christmas have squeezed shoppers to finish their purchases. |
| Canada’s SNC-Lavalin unit to plead guilty to fraud charge in Libya case: La PresseAn SNC-Lavalin Group division will plead guilty to a fraud charge related to projects in Libya after an agreement with prosecutors, La Presse reported on Wednesday, in a case that engulfed Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government in crisis this year. |
| Oil steadies on U.S. crude inventories fall, demand hopesOil prices steadied on Wednesday after U.S. government data showed a decline in crude inventories and on expectations for an uptick in demand next year on the back of progress in resolving the U.S.-China trade fight. |
| “No Individuals Have Been Held Accountable”: WSJ Editorial Board Slams FISA Circus“No Individuals Have Been Held Accountable”: WSJ Editorial Board Slams FISA Circus Following the release of the DOJ Inspector General’s report revealing that the FBI deceived the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court in order to spy on former Trump campaign aide Carter Page, presiding FISC Judge Rosemary Collyer issued a rare public rebuke – while ordering the agency to clean up its act, and fast. |
| Will The Last 2 Weeks Of 2019 Be The Inverse Of 2018?Will The Last 2 Weeks Of 2019 Be The Inverse Of 2018? Authored by Erik Lytikainen via RealInvestmentAdvice.com, Every professional investor knows that month-ending, quarter-ending and year-ending timestamps are important. Throughout the year, positions are hedged against these timestamps, and as a result, the year-ending option expirations almost always have the highest open interest. Generally, the higher the open interest the greater the volatility and financial risk. Last December, in and around the final option expiration of the year, the S&P 500 fell by nearly 300 points. This dramatic decline coincided with a spike in market gamma as shown below. It is my view that this decline was furthered by forced selling by the put sellers who needed to sell the S&P 500 index to cut their losses. As we approach this year and the S&P 500 continues to grind higher, we may be facing the inverse of last year. Call sellers are beginning to feel more pain, as evidenced by a first-time spike in Forecast Gamma Neutral in my December 17th report.  While I am not saying that stocks will melt up through the remainder of the year, the possibility of that scenario playing out is looking more likely. The chart below shows the relationship between the cash value in the SPX and the metric that I call Gamma Neutral. SPX Value versus Prompt-Month Gamma Neutral |
| NY State Judge Dismisses Manafort Case, Paving Way For PardonNY State Judge Dismisses Manafort Case, Paving Way For Pardon A judge dismissed New York’s mortgage-fraud case against former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort, undermining the state’s effort to ensure that the jailed political adviser doesn’t go free if he’s eventually pardoned for his federal crimes. Bloomberg reports that State Supreme Court Justice Maxwell Wiley on Wednesday granted Manafort’s request to dismiss the charges because the state indictment overlaps with cases previously brought by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Manafort lawyers argued that New York’s broad double-jeopardy law protects defendants from multiple prosecutions for the same conduct, even if they were charged in other jurisdictions or by different government authorities. They’ve suggested the New York case was politically motivated.
But the resistance refuses to give up the fight…
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| Lights, Camera, Greta! Teen Environmentalist’s ‘Viral’ Rise Has Been A Documentary This Whole TimeLights, Camera, Greta! Teen Environmentalist’s ‘Viral’ Rise Has Been A Documentary This Whole Time Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old environmentalist who started skipping school in 2018 to protest outside the Swedish parliament, has long been promoted a special needs teen whose tireless mission to shame the west into cap-and-trade went ‘viral’ organically. |
| Ex-CEA Subramanian on why you should worry about economyEx-CEA Subramanian on why you should worry about economy”It is India’s Great Slowdown, where the economy seems headed for the ICU,” Arvind Subramanian said. |
| Unravelling the Tata-Mistry battleUnravelling the Tata-Mistry battleThe tribunal in a ruling on Wednesday said Cyrus Mistry’s dismissal as the chairman of Tata Sons was illegal. |
| Infy co-founder has an advice for India IncInfy co-founder has an advice for India Inc”We must go for global listings. We must attract global funding,” Infosys co-founder Kris Gopalakrishnan said. |
| Market Extra: Why stock-market investors don’t care about impeachment ” and what it would take for that to changeStocks are trading at all-time highs as the House prepares for a vote Wednesday that’s expected to result in the impeachment of President Donald Trump. Here’s why investors are keeping cool ” and what it would take to rattle the markets. |
| The Number One: Netflix is the second best-performing S&P 1500 stock of the decade ” you’ve probably never heard of the firstNetflix and chill ” with some Domino’s Pizza ” has been a winning combination, not only for college kids, but also for investors over the past decade. But there’s a better-performing stock out there. |
| Lenders aren’t moving fast enough to replace Libor, warns global banking monitorBanks should ‘expect increased scrutiny of their transition efforts’ as the end of the scandal-plagued London interbank offered rate, or Libor, approaches in 2021, the Financial Stability Board warned on Wednesday. |
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