Friday Watch

Evening Headlines

Bloomberg:       

• A Fifth of China's Housing Is Empty. That's 50 Million Homes.

• Asian Stocks Decline; Dollar Holds Gain on Fed. Stocks in Asia retreated Friday after three days of gains and an overnight decline in their U.S. counterparts. The dollar strengthened after the Federal Reserve stayed on course to hike interest rates again in December and maintained its gradual tightening path. Benchmarks fell across the region with the deepest losses seen in Hong Kong, while moves in U.S. futures were muted. Energy shares underperformed after oil entered a bear market, and crude prices fell for a tenth day. Treasury yields ticked lower. The offshore yuan held this week’s drop as Friday’s inflation data was in line with expectations. Emerging market currencies slid, with the Korean won, Indonesian rupiah and Philippine peso all lower amid strength in the greenback. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index fell 0.8 percent as of 10:30 a.m. Tokyo time. Topix index slid 0.2 percent. Hang Seng declines 1.5 percent. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index declined 0.4 percent. Futures on the S&P 500 Index fell 0.1 percent.    

• Five Things You Need to Know to Start Your Day.

• Fed Decision Takeaways, China Expo, Draghi on Brexit: Eco Day.

• Acosta, Christie on Short List for Attorney General. 

• Sessions’ Ouster Won’t Affect Mueller Probe, Trump Lawyer Says.  

• Quants Are Facing a Crisis of Confidence.

Wall St. Journal:

• Tesla(TSLA) Taps Boss to Oversee Musk.

• The Democrats’ Cash Tsunami.  

• America Could Use Some Deals.

• Chevron(CVX) Stayed in Venezuela Long After Rivals Quit. Then It Had Second Thoughts.

• U.S. Hits Russians, Ukrainians With Sanctions Over Crimea.

• Saudis Ponder a World Without OPEC.

• House Republicans Jockey for Power Posts in New Role.

• Pelosi’s Speaker Bid Isn’t Quite a Done Deal.

• Fed Holds Rates Steady, Signals More Rate Increases Ahead.

• Washington Prepares for Whitaker at Justice Department.

MarketWatch.com:

• The oil rout just became a bear market for U.S. crude.

• Protesters to Tucker Carlson: ‘We know where you sleep at night’.

Fox News:   

• A heroic officer, niece of actress, aspiring Army service member among those killed in bar shooting.

CNBC:       

• Cramer Remix: Why ETFs can be dangerous for stocks and investors.

• Alibaba(BABA) aims to make cloud computing its 'main business'.

• Fed unwavering in message that interest rates will keep going higher.

• The bull market's biggest buyer is back — companies are buying back stock at a record pace.  

• JP Morgan retail analyst: We could see the 'best back-to-back' holiday season in more than 5 years.

• Dropbox(DBOX) rises after beating estimates on revenue and earnings. 

• Yelp(YELP) tanks more than 28% after announcing third quarter earnings. 

• Activision(ATVI) Blizzard falls 10 percent after reporting decline in monthly active users.

Zero Hedge:

• Larry King: "CNN Stopped Doing News A Long Time Ago".

• China's (Not) SAFE.

• Recount Looms In Florida Republican Victories As Suspicions About Possible Vote-Tampering Emerge.

• Tverberg: "The World Economy Seems To Be Seriously Ill...".

• Trump Proposes Ending Asylum For Illegal Immigrants.

• Why The Hawkish Spin: Wall Street Reacts To The FOMC Statement.

• Wynn Plunges After CEO Sees Similarities With Recession Of 2008.

• Crude Carnage Continues As Fed Sparks Dollar Pop, Stock Drop.

Business Insider:

• China is said to be recruiting an elite group of 'patriotic' kids to help develop AI weapons.

Night Trading 

• Asian equity indices are -1.25% to -.50% on average.

• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 84.0 -.25 basis point. 

• Asia Pacific Sovereign CDS Index 9.5 unch.

• Bloomberg Emerging Markets Currency Index 66.96 -.09%.

• FTSE 100 futures -.25%.

• S&P 500 futures -.06%.

• NASDAQ 100 futures -.13%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note
Company/Estimate
Before the Open:

• (COL)/2.03

• (SUP)/-.31

After the Close:

• (ATHN)/.99

• (GNC)/.09

Economic Releases

8:30 am EST

• PPI Final Demand MoM for October is estimated to rise +.2% versus a +.2% gain in September.

• PPI Ex Food and Energy MoM for October is estimated to rise +.2% versus a +.2% gain in September.
  

10:00 am EST

• Wholesale Trade Sales MoM for September is estimated to rise +.4% versus a +.8% gain in August.

• Preliminary Univ. of Mich. Consumer Sentiment for November is estimated to fall to 98.0 versus 98.6 in October.
  

Upcoming Splits

• None of note

Other Potential Market Movers

• The Fed's Harker speaking, Fed's Williams speaking, China PPI report, (JNPR) investor day and the (DCO) investor day could also impact trading today.

BOTTOM LINE:  Asian indices are lower, weighed down by technology and industrial shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly lower and to rally into the afternoon, finishing mixed.  The Portfolio is 50% net long heading into the day.