A quick spin through the Fed’s December minutes shows that most Fed officials are set on slowing their previously regular rate hike schedule, only reinforcing the message that Fed Chair Powell delivered last week that the central bank will “assess economic conditions before considering additional interest rate increasing” – NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and MarketWatch
Which, as regular readers likely expected, was happy music to Wall Street’s ears – WSJ
Well, this sounds sustainable: after nearly two-and-a-half years, Britain’s looming departure from the EU’s coming down to a giant game of chicken. Lovely – NYTimes [and Bloomberg]
Our regular sources help us understand what comes next now that trade negotiations between American and Chinese midlevel officials have wrapped – NYTimes and WSJ
As the partial federal government shutdown extends into its third week, we’re starting to see some of its far-reaching effects in what are likely unexpected places (for most of us). Case in point: the market for initial public offerings – WSJ and Bloomberg and Marketplace and Law360
Eyes on the post-Fink future, behemoth asset manager BlackRock has elevated Mark Wiedman to the powerful new positing of managing the company’s international operations and corporate strategy, a move that “signals that the firm is grooming” him as a “possible heir” to current Chief Executive Laurence Fink – WSJ
Investors have sued Danske Bank in NY federal court over the money laundering scandal in the German lender’s Estonia branch that they claim cost the bank more than $2.5 billion – Law360
Google has scored a rare win with EU-based regulators after an EU Court of Justice advocate found that the company need not “apply the so-called right to be forgotten globally” – Bloomberg
Soaking up this feature that pulls together science and aesthetics and Darwin to consider the role that beauty plays in evolution and whether an animal’s “innate sense of beauty itself can become an engine of evolution,” other advantageous traits be damned – NYTimes
