India in a fit of Hinduism barred the Mother Teresa charity.

The Dow Jones is inching up with a bit of a Santa Claus rally opening up over .5%. The S&P is also up.

Photo by Artboard Studio on Unsplash

Israeli Pharma

*To be able to pay her dividends despite stock picks falling, Cathie Woods sold stock. The biggest sale given its itty-bitty size hit Compugen, the Israeli drug firm. It is an institutional favorite but many of its backers are on year-end vacation. I nabbed some more cheap shares of CGEN. She also sold Cerus which I also own. I bought more CGEN at $4.355.

*Teva yesterday signed up to be a distributor of cannabis in Israel and the Palestine territory on behalf of Cannbit Tikun Olam. Tikun Olam is Hebrew for repair of the world, a bit excessive for a dealer in pot. Today in UK trading TEVA rose 2.54%, helped also by a rise in the shekel. Teva was boosted by the news and also by getting a license to make generic nasal spray for opioid overdoses using naxalone hydrochloride, the latest of its 550 generic licenses here. 

*Israel is using 4th covid-19 doses aimed at the Omicron variant. This is a trial. 

Other Pharma

*Moderna is fighting an attempt by US shareholders to find out how much the government paid for its vaccines, according to an article in the Financial Times online. My newspaper was not delivered today. MRNA.

*Pfizer's Paxlovid cuts the risks of Covid 19 infection by 88% and it sold 65,000 doses in December. PFE.

*Novavax is being required to offer 2 doses by the WHO for its 6-month booster trials. NVAX.

*Novo Nordisk of Denmark bought Dicerna for $35.25/share, which over 82% of the owners of the acquired shares accepted. NVO.

*Novartis bought unlisted ocular gene technology firm Gyroscope for $1.5 bn. NVS.

*It looks like Astra Zeneca has a new Omicron-specific jab developed by its usual partner, Oxford University. AZN.

*Indivior and Pfizer seem to be losing shareholder appeal. PFE.

Energy

*Once it gains control of the Deer Park refinery in Texas, Mexican state-backed oil company Pemex will sharply lower exports to non-related oil companies. 

*Azure Power regained 2.81% after a hit over its secondary offering of $250 mn yesterday. AZRE.

*The Permian basin in Texas suffered a 4.5 magnitude earthquake today. This adds to the evidence from Groningen, in the Netherlands, that extracting shale may cause quakes.

*VALE failed to get Samarco bond owner's backing for its restructuring.

*Rio Tinto is opening a lithium mine in Serbia. RIO.

Fake meat

*Future Meat raised $347 mn with an IPO.

*Israeli SavorEat which uses a robot chef is next on line. I would love to hear from any reader who actually has tasted fake meat. 

Fake stock

*As both China and the SEC are cracking down on Variable Interest Entities raising funds as if they were stocks, these are now in the dumps. I am too cautious to actually buy these but some gurus are telling their readers to jump in.