Bloomberg - Evening Briefing - The bad China call

When it comes to bad calls, one of the biggest and perhaps most common this year was the assumption that, after China’s catastrophic lifting of Covid-19 restrictions last December—a move which led to an estimated 1.9 million deaths—the reopening boom sure to follow would quickly lift the nation’s economic fortunes. At the start of 2023, Goldman Sachs was among the chorus of Wall Street banks predicting a bright new year in part because of this expected recovery. Some strategists even predicted a 15% rally in the Chinese stock market, and that a bounce in the world’s second-largest economy would lift all boats, helping emerging markets make it a banner year, too. Instead what happened was Chinese stocks moved 15% in the other direction while many emerging markets did just fine anyway. According to Goldman’s Kamakshya Trivedi, the bank’s head of global currency, rates and emerging-markets strategy, this curious result that few saw coming could be seen to impart two key lessons. —David E. Rovella 

This was a year when the world experienced its hottest 12 months on record, when China connected more new coal plants than ever before, US oil production hit the highest level of any country in history and shipment volumes for liquified natural gas reached an all-time high. Moreover, David Fickling writes in Bloomberg Opinion, the annual United Nations climate meeting in Dubai left fossil fuel producers grinning and climate campaigners fuming. In other words, there’s been no shortage of bad climate news in 2023. But worse still, Fickling writes, is the amount of troubling information that’s been drowned out by the bigger stories. Here are three important issues that have flown below the radar.

Cable transports bring coal from a mine to thermal power stations in Sonbhadra, India. There has been growing evidence that the South Asian nation is failing to hit its ambitious targets for clean energy.  Photographer: Ritesh Shukla/Getty Images AsiaPac

Though price pressures may ease a bit in the coming months, that’s little solace to Americans buying homes now. Home prices in the US rose for a ninth straight month, reaching a fresh record as buyers battled for a stubbornly tight supply of listings. A national gauge of prices rose 0.6% in October from September.

Buyers piled into the US Treasury’s auctions Tuesday, seeking to lock in higher yields as the market prices in an aggressive path of Federal Reserve interest-rate cuts in 2024. Indirect bidders, a group that includes foreign central banks, grabbed a record 77.6% of the Treasury’s 52-week bill auction, while the same category took 71.6% of the department’s six-month offering, the third-largest share ever. 

Wall Street began the final week of 2023 by extending a rally that put the market on the brink of a record. The S&P 500 on Tuesday traded less than 0.5% away from its all-time high. Despite warnings about overbought levels, equities continued to power ahead on speculation the Fed will cut rates as early as March. 

Grayscale Investments, the crypto-trust manager hoping to convert the world’s biggest Bitcoin trust into an exchange-traded fund, said Barry Silbert has resigned as its chairman. Silbert is chief executive and founder of Grayscale parent Digital Currency Group, the sprawling crypto conglomerate that’s embroiled in several ongoing disputes in the wake of the 2022 industry meltdown. Mark Murphy, the president of DCG, has also resigned from the Grayscale board. The shakeup comes ahead of a Jan. 10 deadline for the US Securities and Exchange Commission to decide whether to green-light a spot Bitcoin ETF application filed by ARK Investment Management and 21Shares. The regulator could at that time also rule on other similar filings, including Grayscale’s application.

Barry Silbert. Photographer: Joe Buglewicz/Bloomberg

Samsung Electronics reportedly delayed to 2025 mass production plans at its new chip plant in Taylor, Texas, potentially slowing the Biden administration effort to increase domestic semiconductor supplies.  Samsung previously said the factory would start production in the second half of 2024. 

Apple had hoped for a holiday reprieve from the White House in its smartwatch patent dispute. But Santa did not deliver. The administration refused to overturn a sales ban in the US on some of the gadget maker’s watches following an International Trade Commission determination that Apple violated two patents. So what does Apple do now? Go to court.

Apple Watch Series 9 smartwatches Photographer: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg

• Bloomberg Opinion: The case against seizing Russia’s money.
• New forecast has some good news for the future British economy.
• What US recession? How so many economists can be so wrong.
• This is how broken the US health care system is.
• Los Angeles office building sells at 52% discount over 2018 price.
• This ex-CEO has $25 billion more to play with. But first, maybe prison.
• The 11 best beers of the year, chosen by a guy who tasted 879 kinds.

It was easy to criticize big cities that found themselves struggling this year with challenges like climate change, inequality and inadequate transportation. But several new books tackled these issues head on, and offered a path forward. They offered a vital window into the lives of people facing issues like housing instability and fleeing climate disasters. They helped readers think critically about the status quo and pushed leaders to act on inclusive transportation measures and parking reform—and they suggested solutions for global problems with new frameworks like biourbanism. Here’s a roundup of 15 new releases that Bloomberg CityLab read and wrote about this year. 

Source: Bloomberg

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