Today Barron's told us to cut our risk with Chinese electric vehicle stocks. We only own one and already cut our risk by selling 2/3 of our holding in the soaring ADR, in two separate sales this year.

China is not looking good. Its domestic bond market is in disarray after a second borrower defaulted on debt of $153 mn (in RMB). The first was a coal firm. But the new defaulter is Shandong Ruyi, which is part of the country's garment supply chain, being the vendor of Lycra.

China has also arrested the guy in charge of vetting local borrowers for risk, for taking bribes to upgrade ratings. The local bond market has total debt equal to $4 bn and the risk to the regime for its failure is great.

Meanwhile, Beijing is attacking Australia for questioning the origins of the COVID-19 bug and other misdeeds by banning its output from the country. Canberra pointed out that this is a violation of World Trade Organisation rules. Among the goods barred is Oz wine to which I am switching my tipple.

Brazilian Oi, a former holding of Portugal Telecom looted by PT's management and bankers, sold its mobile telecom arm to America Movil of Mexico, Telefonica of Spain, and Telecom Italia sub TIM. None of them speak Portuguese.

More information on the Russian hack attack against US businesses and government bodies reveal leaks hit the websites of the Pentagon, US intelligence services, nuclear and health labs, and about 500 major US corporations. How should the USA retaliate against something like this to prevent repeats?

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Funds

*I switched our country fund to Taiwan Fund TWN, discriminated against because of Chinese objections to its name. I sold Korea Fund KF because it is changing its advisor from Germany's Allianz to JP Morgan.

*Harry Geisel's recent recommendation, Atlantica Sustainable Yield Fund, AY, of Britain, ex-div, was rated buy by Seaport Global. Its part-owner Algonquin Power & Utilities AQN was rated strong buy by Raymond James. Ir also is a dividend aristocrat and a green play.

*Western Asset Emerging Markets Debt Fund (EMD) will pay out another 2.5c/share in return of capital for this year, bringing the total of capital return to 28.58¢. The earned investment income this year was 79.92¢/sh all taken after the spring as part of the fund's managed distribution policy. Since getting your own money back is not a way to gain from funds, sell EMD at $13.92.

Banksters

*CBOE Global Markets runs the options exchange in Chicago and is down because its securities information processors (SIP) pected to face competition under new SEC rules opening SIP data to US retail investors. Telis Demos of the Wall St. Journal says CBOE got about 9% of its net revenue in 2019 from SIP data sold to the world by CBOE DataShopand the stock has fallen about 6% since the SEC announced the new rules. His source was Piper Sandler. The rest of its revenue came from actual trading fees on puts and calls in the US and data from foreign markets where it operates. It owns Bats Global Markets, bought in 2017, which turned CBOE from being a membership outfit into a for-profit company. It now offers trading in options and futures on US, Canadian, and European equities, Exchange-traded products, foreign exchange, and volatility plays based on the CBOE Volatility Index or VIX It runs a European stock exchange and Euro CCP, an equity clearinghouse. It covers the UK FTSE. Cboe also owns CBOEvest which sells data to institutional users and which has upped its fees for 2021. However, it has long offered academic researchers historical datasets at a discount and the greeks (Delta, Gamma, Theta, Vega, and Rho). They get 12:45 data rather than closing data. 121:45 is more accurate than end-of-day prices in showing market liquidity.

It also publishes the warning booklet on options trading for retail investors, Characteristics, and Risks of Standardized Options.

Moreover, competition in data is not new and exchange operators already compete on timely data, tech, and software services, as well as cybersecurity, according to Moody's. CBOE limits how much of its stock can be bought by brokers and other participants in options trading so it is relatively cheap for retail investors willing to buy into it. It will report on its Q4 in Feb 2021 before the opening, at 8:30 am EST.

*Barclays Bank in Britain was fined £6 mn for misinforming borrowers in arrears of their rights.

*Bank of America-Merrill Lynch BAC was fined $26 mn for failing to stop a New Hampshire manager from churning accounts to boost his commissions.

*Nordea NRDBY, the spun-off Finnish bank that used to be owned by Sampo Oij SAXPY, is helping its client companies check on their diversity levels by race, sex, and sexual orientation.

Drugs

*Novartis NVS dropped work its corona-virus drug rutolitinib for poor results. NVS is Swiss and ruthless. It fell 1% today.

*Fellow Swiss Roche RHHBY will be able to shorten the time for its multiple sclerosis drug infusions to 2 hours. RHHBY also won the approval of its new PIK3CA cobas mutation test in breast cancer exams. It also got approval for its Venclexda in Canada for treating acute myeloid leukemia in patients too old to get chemotherapy.

*A second major drug buy for the week came with Eli Lilly LLY paying $22.5 per share plus a contingent fee to buy Prevail Therapeutics PRVL.

*Moderna MRNA data was hacked in Europe via the European Medicines Agency just as it is about to be ok'd for COVID-19 in the USA.

*Israeli Enlivex Therapeutics, ENLV, which may have a preventive against COVID-19 surges, rose to a high of $10.19

*Bristol Myers was added to the Goldman Sachs conviction list yesterday. I inherited BMY from my late mother's portfolio and it rose nearly 4% today, the day after her birthday.

*BioAtla is the next biotech planning a secondary offering of 9.4 mn new shares at $15-17. It has antibody-drug conjugates in development against sarcoma, melanoma, and non-small cell lung cancer and owns over 500 patents in biotech. It is headed by Scott Smioth, a former BMY exec, and Pfizer (PFE) owns over 10% of BCAB shares. It will work with our BeiGene of China to do more phase I trials next year. BGNE is up 4.51% on the news.

*Apologies to Martin of Vancouver whom I was rude about yesterday. He wrote up Abcellera Biologics ABCL last Friday in a note I made more emphatic for editorial reasons, but he insists he was not saying to buy it then after it rose 250%. I also missed the timing of his note because he is 4 hours behind me and I thought he was writing about a stock that came out Thursday, not Friday. It has fallen about 5% today because it was rushed into by the usual newbies this time from Canada. At $46.17, ABCL's low today, average down. But keep your powder dry for more drops.

Energy

*With oil up again, the usual suspects are rising, BP plc up 2.13%; Royal Dutch Shell B RDS-B up 3.1%, and Schlumberger SLB up 3.56%.

*Energy Fuels of Canada is up another 5.9%. UUUU is getting into the rare earths business.

*Canadian Solar, CSIQ, rose another 9.5% today.

*Uranium miner Cameco CCJ which shut in its Cigar Lake mine because of COVID-19 risk gained another 3.5%. It was recommended by Scotia Bank today with a target prices of C$19, up from 16. It was also maintained as outperform by Raymond James. It was given a new TP of C$17.5 up from 16 by Eight Capital. Its options traded heavily. Note that it was rated sell by The Investment Reporter of Canada in its last issue because of low uranium prices. CCJ is likely to close at a new high from Nov. 2015 today at $`13.81, up 4%.

Food

*Nutrien, maker of fertilizer and seller of farm equipment was raised to Buy with a $55 target price, up from $47 by Royal Bank of Canada. NTR trades in US$s and rose 2%.

*Alimentation Couche-Tard, ANCUF (ATD.B in Toronto) is up 1.4% today on Canaccord Genuity raising its TP to C$53 from 49. Iyd retail network sell food and fuel in America, Europe, and Asia.

*Irish Greencore GNCGF, sold, fell 0.7% today to $1.46/sh.

*Grupo Bimbo, the Mexican bakery giant, fell 2.65% today. GRBMF