Friday Watch

Evening Headlines

Bloomberg:           

• China Imports Oil Doctored to Skirt U.S. Sanctions on Venezuela.
• Biden Unveils U.S. Plan; Singapore Weighs Limits: Virus Update.  
• Asia Shares Slip; Tech Stocks Lift U.S. Indexes: Markets Wrap.
• Oil Slips With Global Viral Resurgence Highlighting Demand Risks.  
• Stimulus-Sanity, China Deal Failure, Europe Double-Dip: Eco Day.  
• Bitcoin Drops Below $30,000 Level as Head-Turning Rally Stalls.
• Bitcoin Plunge Has Newbies Scrambling to Google Double-Spend.
• Covid Cases Fall in 46 States, But Biden Warns of More Death.  
• Yellen Leaves Door Open to Tax Increase on Wealthy Americans.
  
• Biden to Freeze Oil and Coal Leasing on Federal Land.  
• 50 Companies to Watch in 2021.  
• Florida Bank Added to List of Companies Ending Ties With Trump.
• Here Are the U.S. Companies Hitting Pause on Political Donations.

Wall Street Journal:

• Joe Biden’s Inaugural Purge.
• Biden Learns to Love Brett Kavanaugh.
• U.S. Quickly Rejoined Paris Climate Accord. Meeting the Emissions Goals Will Be Harder.
• Florida to Require Vaccine Recipients to Show Proof of Residency.

Fox News:   

• WATCH: Biden gets testy with reporter over vaccine rollout question.
• Unrest explodes across West after Biden is sworn in.
  

CNBC.com:

• Dr. Fauci says new data shows Covid vaccines appear to be less effective against some new strains.
• Stocks making the biggest moves after hours: IBM, Seagate, Ford & more.
• Joe Biden’s business allies discuss ways to pay for infrastructure plan, including a carbon tax.
• Biden facing pressure to scale back his $1.9 trillion Covid relief plan.
• Intel’s new CEO says troubled chip project is recovering, may still outsource some manufacturing.

MarketWatch.com: 

• Bitcoin’s skid rings alarm bells as money manager says retreat to $20,000 ahead.  
• All of President Biden’s key early executive orders — in one chart.

Zero Hedge:

• Suddenly Optimistic Fauci Sees Pandemic "Plateauing," Feels "Liberated" Under Biden Admin.
• Senate Dems File Ethics Complaint Against Cruz, Hawley For Objecting To Electoral Results.
• Intel Released Earnings Early Because Hacker "Stole Financially Sensitive Information" From Its Website.
• China Appeals To "Kind Angels" Of Biden Administration, Blames Trump For "Burning Bridges".
• Japan To Cancel "Doomed" Olympics: Report.
• Anti-Trump "Oversight Board" To Determine Whether Trump Will Regain Access To Facebook.
• Right On Cue For Biden, WHO Admits High-Cycle PCR Tests Produce COVID False Positives.
• IBM Plunges After Reporting Lowest Q4 Revenue This Century, Slowdown In Cloud And Another Grotesque EPS Fudge.
• Growth Stocks' "Line In The Sand" Defended Again, Bitcoin Battered.
• Einhorn's Greenlight Made A Record 25% In Q4, Mocks Tesla's "Valuation-Indifferent" Investors: Full Letter.
• My Pillow CEO Says Bed Bath & Beyond, Kohl's To Stop Selling His Products.

Newsmax:

• McConnell Wants to Give Trump 2 Weeks to Prep for Impeachment Trial.
• Pelosi: Senate to Get Trump Impeachment for Trial Soon.
• Ex-WH Adviser Navarro: 'Forget Unity' if There's an Impeachment Trial.
• Biden Suspends New Oil and Gas Leases, Permits for 60 Days.
  

NBC 10 Philadelphia:

• These Are the Companies Taking a Stand on the U.S. Capitol Protest by Pulling Their Political Donations. Many of the country's biggest companies across industry sectors, from Ford Motor Co. to Airbnb to Boston Scientific, announced suspensions of all PAC donations. The list of companies pledging change, which continues to grow, included the financial services companies JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup and the tech behemoths Microsoft, Facebook and Google. A host of other large companies, including Delta Air Lines, Wells Fargo, Walmart and Bank of America, said they would take the unprecedented events of last week into account when considering future political donations.

TheGatewayPundit.com:

• President Trump Is Talking to Allies About Starting a New Pro-American Political Party to Take on GOP and Democrats.
• Maskless Biden Visits Lincoln Memorial After Signing EO Mandating Masks on Federal Property (VIDEO).
• Montana Lawmakers Move to Protect Girls’ Sports After Biden Signs Order Forcing Schools to Let Transgender Biological Males Compete With Them.
• BREAKING: Trust in Fake News Mainstream Media at ALL-TIME LOW.
• BREAKING: GOP Lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Greene Introduces Articles of Impeachment on President Joe Biden.
• Lou Dobbs Warns GOP: “Those 74 Million Americans if They Continue to Be Insulted – Are Going to Say “To Hell With You!” And the Patriot Party Will Be Born (VIDEO).
• FBI Arrests CDC Critic Dr. Simone Gold on Monday After She Was Filmed in the US Capitol Walking Around with a Bullhorn — FBI Singled Her Out.
• Four GOP Reps DIDN’T VOTE on Impeachment – Along with the 10 Turncoats Who Voted to Impeach Trump – Update.
  

The Epoch Times:

• Mysteriously Rapid Increase of Chinese Patent Filings Addressed in US Government Report.
• Shanghai Announces New CCP Virus Outbreak, Including Hospital Workers.

HereIsTheEvidence.com:

• This is for aggregating publicly available items of voter fraud evidence in the US election that would be admissible in court.
  

Digital Blackboard:

• Daily New Cases by Region.

Worldometer:

• New Cases/Deaths by state.

Rt Covid-19:

• How fast virus is growing by state.

KFF:

• State Data(Tests/Hospitalizations).

Night Trading 

• Asian equity indices are -.5% to +.25% on average.

• Asia Ex-Japan Investment Grade CDS Index 60.25 -.75 basis point.

• China Sovereign CDS 30.0 -.5 basis point.

• Bloomberg Emerging Markets Currency Index 62.66 -.04%.
• Bloomberg Global Risk-On/Risk Off Index 2,216.0 +21.0 points.
• Volatility Index(VIX) futures 24.85 +1.33%.
• FTSE 100 futures +.01%.

• S&P 500 futures -.16%.

• NASDAQ 100 futures -.23%.

Morning Preview Links

Earnings of Note 
Company/Estimate 

 

Before the Open: 

• (ALLY)/1.06
• (BLMN)/.04
• (KSU)/1.92
• (EDU)/.33
• (RF)/.42
• (SLB)/.17
  

After the Close:

• None of note
  

Economic Releases

9:45 am EST

• The Markit US Manufacturing PMI for Jan. is estimated to fall to 56.5 versus 57.1 in Dec.
• The Markit US Services PMI for Jan. is estimated to all to 53.4 versus 54.8 in Dec. 
  

10:00 am EST

• Existing Home Sales for Dec. is estimated to fall to 6.56M versus 6.69M in Nov.

Upcoming Splits

• None of note
  

Other Potential Market Movers

• The Eurozone PMI report could also impact trading today.

Market Hours
Normal:

• 9:30 am - 4:00 pm EST
  

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly lower, weighed down by financial and energy shares in the region. I expect US stocks to open modestly lower and to rally into the afternoon, finishing mixed. The Portfolio is 75% net long heading into the day.