Financial Markets and Economy
Five Charts That Show American Exceptionalism Is a Myth (Bloomberg)
Jeremy Grantham, chief investment strategist at GMO, has some bad news for Americans.
GoPro stock surges on talk Apple may buy the whole company (Market Watch)
Shares of GoPro rocketed 16% on Thursday after the second analyst in three months floated GoPro as a potential acquisition target for Apple.
Buying GoPro whose stock has fallen 45% over the last few months amid record-high levels of short interest, would “make sense” for Apple said FBR & Co. analyst Dan Ives in a note to clients Thursday, particularly as it works to build its software ecosystem amid saturation in global smartphone sales.
Wall Street still thinks Apple should buy Tesla (Business Insider)
Apple has over $200 billion of cash in hand — and Wall Street still thinks it's best to spend it on buying Tesla.
In a note published Thursday, FBR & Co.'s Dan Ives picked Tesla as one of the four big acquisition prospects for Apple, as the company seeks a new growth engine for the coming decade.
Why Cuba is ripe for investment (CNN)
Ramphis Castro, no relation to the Cuban leaders, is a Kauffman Fellow and founder of Mindchemy, a startup bringing technology entrepreneurship to the developing world. He is also managing director for Founder Institute NYC, the world's largest idea-stage accelerator.
U.S. Household Wealth Fell $1.23 Trillion in Third Quarter on Lower Stocks (Bloomberg)
Americans household wealth declined in the third quarter, reflecting a slump in stock prices that have since recovered.
Surprising rally in energy stocks points to bullish trend (Market Watch)
The rally in energy sector over the past two sessions in the face of falling oil prices is surprising to say the least.
Ford will invest $4.5 billion in electric cars — and wants to compete with Uber and Lyft (Business Insider)
Dearborn, Mich. – Ford Motor Co wants to develop ride hailing services that could compete with existing players such as Uber or Lyft, the company's head of research said Thursday.
"Our vision is to be a mobility service provider, beyond building a vehicle that would be in somebody else's fleet," said Ken Washington, Ford's vice president of research. "We see this as a business we want to be in."
Why low volatility stocks could be your best bet for 2016 (Yahoo! Finance)
Investors should brace for larger market fluctuations by choosing low volatility stocks rather than those of companies that are more market sensitive, said Chad Morganlander, portfolio manager at Stifel Nicolaus’ Washington Crossing Advisors.
Asian Futures Signal Rebound Amid Fed Countdown; Oil's Below $37 (Bloomberg)
While most Asian index futures foreshadowed rebounds, Australian stocks couldn’t move past the ongoing decline in oil with mining shares resuming losses. The dollar solidified gains as investors looked ahead to weekend data out of China and the looming Federal Reserve meeting.
This corner of the stock market is a 'trap' (Business Insider)
Deutsche Bank's David Bianco, like many of his peers, thinks the bull market in stocks still has some life in it.
His call is for the S&P 500 to hit 2,250 by the end of 2016. That implies a roughly 10% rally from today's levels.
Buybacks, mergers to fuel $450 billion worth of stock demand in 2016 (Market Watch)
Armed with flush funds and healthy earnings growth, U.S. corporations are expected to continue buying back shares and pursuing mergers at a rapid rate in 2016, potentially generating nearly a half trillion dollars worth of demand for stocks.
“We expect corporations will purchase $450 billion of U.S. equity during 2016 through buybacks and cash M&A,” said David Kostin, chief U.S. equity strategist at Goldman Sachs, in a Thursday research report.
Hong Kong on the Brink as Developers Offer Stealth Price Cuts (Bloomberg)
Kowloon Development Co.s Upper East project in Hong Kongs Hung Hom area is offering a raft of rebates and hidden discounts that can reduce the cost to a buyer as much as 14 percent, and it will throw in a second mortgage too.
8 issues that define whether Tesla is doomed or has a bright future (Business Insider)
Tesla's a polarizing company, and perhaps nowhere is that more evident than on Wall Street.
Among research analysts, long-term predictions for the company's share price range from as low as $180 to $450.
Gold ends lower as bearish sentiment takes hold (Market Watch)
Gold futures ended lower Thursday, bucking a trend that has seen the precious metal record modest back-to-back gains, as investors grew more wary ahead of the U.S. Federal Reserve’s meeting next week.
Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts – Exceptional Hypocrisy (Jesse's Cafe Americain)
Gold and silver finished largely unchanged in a lightly traded session.
Four Charts That Show the Challenges in Yahoo's Core Business (Bloomberg)
Yahoo! Inc. is planning to carve out its main Web business into a standalone company, part of a tax-saving "complex transaction" to separate its $31 billion stake in Alibaba Holding Group Ltd.
GoPro drone and Apple Watch news launches stock rebound (Market Watch)
GoPro Inc. announced the name of its new drone set to launch in the first half of 2016 — Karma.
That’s really all we know about the drone, which GoPro GPRO, +11.49% Chief Executive Nick Woodman confirmed in May. GoPro also released footage in October from a prototype of its new drone, and included a video with its announcement, though it does not show the actual drone.
'The Central Bank Hall of Shame' (Business Insider)
At this point, it seems like the data is favorable enough to justify the Federal Reserve hiking interest rates for the first time since June 2006.
Yum Brands' Bonds Downgraded to Junk Status at Standard & Poor's (Bloomberg)
Yum! Brands Inc. had its bond rating downgraded to junk by Standard & Poors Ratings Services, which said the planned share buybacks and dividends the company outlined on Thursday will likely require increased debt.
Atlassian Shares Surge on Trading Debut (NY Times)
The robust showing brings an upbeat close to what has been a generally dismal year for initial public offerings.
Here's why an inverted yield curve is bad news for America (Business Insider)
Economists look at the US Treasury yield curve as an indication of the health of the economy.
U.S. Steel Saved From Worst Year Ever as Metal Rout Cuts Imports (Bloomberg)
Steel prices in the U.S. have dropped so much that imports are finally declining. Thats giving shares of U.S. Steel Corp. some relief in a year that was shaping up to be the worst in decades.
You're missing 20% of your investment portfolio — and it's costing you thousands (Business Insider)
Chances are your investment portfolio is built around the old fashioned rule of 60% stocks and 40% bonds, right? Well, if that's true you're off by about 20%.
If you compared your portfolio to those of the most successful investors in the world, you’d notice one big difference – real estate.
Politics
Clinton's Plan to Complicate Corporate Taxes (Bloomberg View)
To Hillary Clinton, corporations are being unpatriotic when theycombine with a smaller foreign company and then move their legal addresses overseas, where taxes are lower. This week she released a plan to stop such tax-avoidance trickery, which has been on the rise in recent years.
Let's be clear: It's no more unpatriotic for companies to try to lower their tax bills than it was for the Clintons to take a deduction for donating used skivvies to a charity, as they did in the 1980's.
How Many Republicans Really Want to Ban Muslims? (The Atlantic)
Here’s the good news: In a poll released Thursday evening, NBC News found that 60 percent of Americans oppose Donald Trump’s patently unconstitutional proposal to ban Muslim immigration.
Now, the bad news: A small but real plurality of Republican respondents support the proposal—42 percent, with 36 opposing it. When limited to GOP primary voters, however, the tally is 38 percent for, 39 percent against.
Technology
Drone Giant DJI Teaming With FLIR On Aerial Thermal Imaging Camera (Fast Company)
The camera is ideal for firefighting, search-and-rescue, agriculture, inspection, and other industries.
China's DJI, the world's largest maker of drones, has teamed up with FLIR, a leader in thermal imaging technology, on an aerial camera capable of detecting subtle differences in heat signatures.
Adidas’ Intelligent Robots Will Have Your Feet Covered Faster Than Ever (PSFK)
adidas revealed a first glimpse into the future of production with its pilot SPEEDFACTORY in Germany. Using automated manufacturing to bring production to where the consumer is, SPEEDFACTORIES create high-performance sporting goods faster than ever before.
SPEEDFACTORY includes intelligent robot technology that not only offers the highest performance quality but also presents a unique design to the shoes. The first concept shoes, comprising of 500 pairs of running footwear, will be revealed in the first half of 2016 with high-volume production for consumers set to launch in the near future.
Health and Life Sciences
Do these pollutants sap TB vaccine’s power? (Futurity)
Early life exposures to toxic chemicals such as PCBs and DDT dampen an infant’s response to the tuberculosis vaccine, according to a new study.
The significance of the research extends far beyond TB vaccine responses and exposures to these two chemicals, says Todd Jusko, an assistant professor in the University of Rochester departments of environmental medicine and public health sciences, who led the study.
Is Happiness Really Linked To Longevity? Maybe Not, Study Finds (Forbes)
Here’s another reason to be happy – or not, depending on your disposition: Happiness may not be as strongly linked to longevity as previous research had indicated. A huge new study in The Lancet finds that among 700,000 women in Britain, those who were happy vs. unhappy had about the same risk of mortality over the years. Though being unhappy – or depressed, lonely, or stressed – may make you less apt to take care of your health in any number of ways, as the study reports, it may not itself make you less any healthy.
Life on the Home Planet
Collecting Cow Farts: The Stupid-Brilliant Solution To Global Warming (Fast Company)
As the world eats more meat, methane emissions from livestock are becoming a bigger climate concern. It's time to take that seriously.
Our food habits are a big cause of climate change. Because the world wants to eat more animal products these days, the cow, sheep and goat population is growing (3.6 billion at last count), and consequently more emissions are going into the atmosphere. We tend to associate global warming with industry and energy generation, but ruminants shouldn't be forgotten.
Ban Cars (Gizmodo)
Today, 195 countries will announce that even a global effort to reduce emissions probably won’t prevent the catastrophic warming of the planet. But there is a way we can reach our climate goals. It’s not a pledge. It’s not a tax. It’s easier than that. We ban cars.
