The weather in London is sunny and pleasant, not too cold. If it remains as nice, the UK election will see more voters than would turn out if the icy winds and storms had continued. More old folks will stagger out to the polls.

It is really a tough call. Our local area voted 2/3 for Labor the last time round when a British-looking man was running. This time we have a very young woman of Bangladeshi heritage with a headscarf raised in a council house (housing project). Her program calls for re-nationalizing council flats which were privatized under Maggie Thatcher and also putting the state in control of telephone and internet, railways, and other privatized sectors. She will not do as well.

The national outlook for Boris Johnson, however, has been seriously damaged by his lack of sympathy for the 4-year-old on the hospital floor with pneumonia as there was no available bed at the National Health Service hospital he was taken to. The last YouGov poll to be published shows the Tories still in the lead but only for 359 seats. This means the odds for a “hung parliament” with no majority has grown. To carry Parliament alone, the winning party needs 345 votes. It is too close to call.

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal carries a shocking article:

“U.S. regulators decided to allow the 737 MAX jet to keep flying after its first fatal crash last fall, despite their own analysis indicating it could become one of the most accident-prone airliners in decades without design changes.

“The November 2018 internal Federal Aviation Administration analysis, expected to be released during a House committee hearing Wednesday, reveals that without agency intervention, the MAX could have averaged one fatal crash about every two or three years, according to industry officials and regulators. “That amounts to a substantially greater safety risk than either Boeing or the agency indicated publicly at the time.” Deregulation is great but passenger safety overrides it. Boeing will not be delivering 737Max planes this year to any carrier.

*Mazel tov, Your Highness. Prince Mohammed bin Salmon won out in the end, as the stock price of Saudi Aramco went up the daily maximum of 10% in the first minutes after the opening of its first day of trading. This pushed its total valuation to the highest ever for any share issue, to $3 trillion, the Prince's target. There was a lot of negativism yesterday but in the end the Crown Prince got what he wanted thanks to demand from outside the Kingdom for the huge oil company--despite brokerage and press negativism. Mazel tov is Hebrew for congratulations, as I cannot say it in Arabic. Now let's hope the money will be spent wisely for the Saudi Arabian future.

Pharma

*Roche will report impressive 6-yr follow up data for its Perjeta (peruzumab), Herceptin (trastuzumab), plus chemo in treating HER-2 neu positive breast cancer at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.

The Perjeta regimen reduced the risk of breast cancer recurrence or death by 24% compared to Herceptin + chemo + placebo (hazard ratio = 0.76). At year 6, 90.6% of patients in the Perjeta arm were progression-free versus 87.8% of those in the control arm, representing an absolute benefit of 2.8%.

RHHBY sub-Genentech applied for a biologics license from the US FDA for Xolair (omalizumab) for treating nasal polyps in adults who failed to respond to treatment with corticosteroids, If approved, Xolair would become the first antibody to cut the size and symptoms of nasal polyps by targeting and blocking immunoglobulin E. The FDA must decide on approval by Q3 2020 based on 2 phase III trials. Nasal polyps are a common debilitating condition impacting 13 million people in the USA. There are few treatment options and surgery or steroids often fail to control the symptoms as the polyps grow back. These noncancerous lesions on the lining of the nasal sinuses or cavity cause irritation and inflammation, which can block normal airflow. RHHBY is Swiss.

*Value Line 600 blog yesterday recommended Walgreens Boots Alliance, the Italian owned multinational drugstore chain, like a good stock for 2020. Having visited Boots Canary Wharf yesterday to get an OTC eye drug which was not in stock but selling at 3 for 2, I can assure you that its UK arm is not doing a roaring lot of business before Christmas and shoppers are few and far between despite the promotions of perfume and make-up and stuffed toys.

*Japan's Eisai fell 1.5% overnight to $74.65, overriding concerns about the latest twists in the tale of its Alzheimer's disease drug being developed with Biogen Idec. ESALY is a generalist drug firm formally founded on Dec. 6, 1941, one day before Pearl Harbor, so it is used to ups and downs.

*Teva crashed down 3.4% yesterday to just below $9.50. It is suffering because the short-sellers have now all capitulated.

*Fellow Israeli drug startup firm Compugen rose 2.4% to $13 overnight.

*Beigene, the Chinese drug firm, briefly rose back over $190 yesterday, my entry price. But it closed at $182.38. Yesterday in Hong Kong it traded at HK$103.38.

*Zymeworks is up in the pre-market hitting $42.41. ZYME is a Canada drug developer aiming at dual targets.

*John Buckingham is calling for investors to buy Bristol Myers Squib, a US drug company now being talked up a lot. I inherited my shares from my late mother and kept them out of respect for her. BMY is up 1.2%

Tech & Tel

*Naspers and Proses are appealing directly to shareholders in Just Eat to view its offer as the more generous after it got permission from Spanish stock exchange authorities to do so. NPSNY; PROSY.

*German Telefonica, to set up for 5G, is calling on help from both Finnish Nokia, the clean western firm, and Chinese Huawei, supposedly the source of security risks. This is a smart compromise if the firm can verify what is being put in place, despite US warnings that you cannot. NOK was up 0.9% yesterday after it fell earlier this week.

*Chris Loew, our reporter in Japan, worries about the prospects of telco NTT Docomo which hit a yearly high yesterday after a deal to bring Magic Leap spatial computing into its systems for customers, mostly businesses. I asked him to look further into whether this makes sense. Chris is a bit of a Japan bear as he lives there. In fact among telcos, DCMYY is a rare riser.

Japan is facing negativism after the Abe government simultaneously raised sales taxes to cut the deficit and deficit spending to boost the economy with infrastructure projects. The longest ruling Japanese government is confused.

*Nintendo, the gaming firm, is up another 2.4% overnight to another new high. Its Switch platform is being widely sold now in China by its new partner, Tencent. Chinese gamers mostly use cellphones where it is hard to play. And getting a Switch is cheaper than visiting a Chinese laptop computer shop to play away.

Banksters and brokers

*India's central bank under-reported dud loans reported to it by the country's banks by $1.68 billion. If you cannot trust the numbers from the State Bank of India you don't want to invest in India. It is one thing for Eros International to misstate its debts. But not the central bank. Our current India portfolio includes solar energy developer Azure Power and on-line travel agency MakeMyTrip. Both AZRE and MMYT are run and funded from outside India itself. The local India stock that was hit the hardest yesterday, it was PayTM.

*HSBC where I have my US personal account has been hit with US fines of $192 mn for tax evasion via its Swiss branch on behalf of American customers, not including your editor who pays up. I use my account there to handle stocks it is hard to cover using a discount brokerage (HSBC charges $60 per trade), which is becoming increasingly important as the discounters now cannot get prices at all.

*Banco Santander is up 0.8% in European trading after cutting its payments to its UK top official for his pension plan. This is because others in the UK and elsewhere will also be getting less perks.

*Hang Seng Bank of Hong Kong rose 2.7% to $20.77. HSNGY is gaining because its bank is not controlled from China (as it is a listed sub of HSBC), and because it publishes the main Hong Kong stock index. Yesterday, the Hang Seng index broke through its resistance level of 26565.5 in Hong Kong, which is more optimistic than I am.

*Because I am in London with a British newspaper to hand, I know that the price of Virgin Money, the bank formerly called Clydesdale & Yorkshire Banking Group, and before that the one called Virgin Money is not what the market maker says it is. VMUK is trading at GBX7.50 in Britain but its ADR is not functional. It is over $9.75 if you want to sell. Don't accept a penny less.

*Chilean fertilizer and lithium firm Antofagasta is another mispriced ADR. It is up 6.8% in the UK but this is not showing in the US. Its price is £9.028, and you can multiply by 1.3 to get a close approximation of the dollar price. It was the second-best performer in the FTSE 100 yesterday.

*Yet another missing link is Greencore, formally Irish but also traded mostly in London. The food distributor is up 44% YTD and trades at £2.593, a new high. Since the ADR is equal to 4 shares you need to multiply by 4 and by 1.3 to get the right US price. Or just complain to your broker if they post something else. I get nowhere with my broker. The correct price is about $13.49. GNCGY was downrated to hold by Peel Hunt brokers.

Industrials and energy

*Schlumberger Ltd gained 0.5% overnight in London. It may be because of the Saudi stock jump or because oil prices are up a bit.

*BP plc is no longer alone in having written down its valuation of oil and gas reservoirs because of costs and likely lower demand. Yesterday, another major, Chevron, did the same.

*I pity the Investec oil analyst who was busy yesterday writing down their forecasts for Tullow Oil after its shocker stock drop of over 70% yesterday.

*French Veolia Environnement which cleans up our area of London was up 1.4% yesterday in European trading. It is the contractor for this Labor constituency where I see its vans collecting dead leaves.

*Nutrien of Canada was given a lower target price by Morgan Stanley, $50 from $54. NTR makes fertilizer and sells what they need to grow things to farmers worldwide.

*Eon SE of Germany is up 2.63% heute. EONGY is a power supplier.

*Delek Group of Israel sold the remaining 14.99% stake it held in its former Autosystems sub for NIS 269 mn or $77.5 mn. It needs the cash to develop field offshore Britain and the US Gulf of Mexico in its zeal to become a global oil player.

*Mexichem that was, now Orbia, maker of plastic drip pipes for agriculture and other chemical goods, was over $4 at the close yesterday. It should be up further in US trading after the President and Congress agreed to the new Nafta deal on trade with Mexico and Canada, called USMCA.

Canada. The peso is also up in European trading Weds.

Funds

*Korea Fund gained after its big but complex dividend.

*Gold (which we own two ways with 2 closed-end funds) is up on renewed uncertainty over British and US politics. We own SPDR Gold, GLD, and IAU.