The key catalyst for stocks will likely continue to be the expected trajectory of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy. In September, historically the weakest month for stocks, the S&P 500 fell nearly 5%. The S&P 500 gained nearly 9% gain in November, historically a strong month for the index. Overall, December has been the second-best month for the S&P 500, with the index up an average of 1.54% for the month since 1945, according to CFRA. Many other names have languished: The equal-weighted S&P 500, whose performance is not skewed by big tech and growth stocks, is up around 6% in 2023.

An inmate was charged Friday with stabbing ex-Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin. Chauvin was convicted of murdering George Floyd and was serving his sentence in a federal prison in Arizona. The inmate, who nearing the end of a 30-year sentence, was accused of planning the attack. John Turscak stabbed Chauvin 22 times at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson and said he would have killed Chauvin had correctional officers not responded so quickly, federal prosecutors said. He became an FBI informant in 1997, providing information about the gang and recordings of conversations he had with other Mexican Mafia members and associates.

If you’re remotely fashion-minded, now’s the time to swaddle yourself dramatically in oversize shawls and wraps. Consider the vast swaths of wool that draped models’ entire upper bodies at Saint Laurent’s fall show. For Melanie Masarin, 32, the Los Angeles founder of nonalcoholic aperitif brand Ghia, they evoke memories of her childhood in France. My mother and grandmother have always worn wraps like this,” she said. “I’m craving fuzzy, cozy, wraparound knits to shield me from the news these days.”

People and businesses could use a digital pound to make payments, with the BoE suggesting a limit of up to 20,000 pounds for digital wallets provided by banks, far higher than the 3,000 euros discussed by the European Central Bank for a digital euro. The committee's "The digital pound: still a solution in search of a problem?" The prospect of a digital pound, now in the design phase, has raised concerns that it would allow the authorities to spy on what people spend on, and that it could spell the end of cash. "We recommend that any primary legislation used to introduce a digital pound does not allow the Government or Bank of England to use the data from a digital pound for any purposes beyond those already permitted for law enforcement," the report said. The BoE has said interest should not be payable on digital pound deposits, but the committee said this position should be reviewed.

Cat Bohannon’s book, “Eve,” erases any lingering misconception about the centrality of women, giving us a detailed look at women’s biology, focused on how—as the subtitle indicates—“the female body drove 200 million years of human evolution.”Grab a Copy Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution By Cat Bohannon Knopf 624 pages We may earn a commission when you buy products through the links on our site. but otherwise, just the same as men’s,” and she critiques the persistent tendency of researchers and physicians to take male bodies as the norm. “From mouse to human, the male body is what gets studied,” she writes. In some circles, it is heretical to maintain that women and men are biologically different, largely because such differences have in the past been manipulated toward misogynist ends. Ms. Bohannon believes that “while the majority of scientists still effectively ignore the female body, there’s a quiet revolution in the science of womanhood brewing.”

The idea that children are imaginative but adults are not is a popular theme in children’s literature. “Do you really mean we won’t be able to hear that when we’re older?” asks one of the children. “You’ll hear all right,” explains Mary Poppins, “but you won’t understand.”In these stories, children are open to possibilities that elude the adult mind. They grasp extraordinary ideas that adults cannot fathom and have clever insights that adults do not appreciate. Children play elaborate make-believe games with their toys and role-playing games with their peers.

Yssabel Pangilinan, a software engineer in the San Francisco Bay Area, hired a traditional photographer and videographer to capture memories of her wedding at a Napa Valley estate in June. Tiers of joy“For me, that wasn’t good enough,” says Pangilinan, 30. Conventional pictures and videos often take weeks to be edited and delivered. “I wanted to be able to see something right away,” she adds.

The rise of SpaceX as the dominant force for U.S. rocket launches has meant that NASA’s role is now evolving. To find out what this means for the future of the space agency, WSJ’s George Downs sat down with NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy. Photo Illustration: George DownsJeff Bezos and Elon Musk have both spent decades building space companies. Now, Bezos’ Amazon .com is turning to Musk’s SpaceX for a ride to orbit. Amazon, which Bezos founded and where he still serves as executive chairman, said Friday that it hired Musk’s SpaceX to conduct three rocket launches for the Seattle company’s planned satellite-internet division.

“The key thing we have to watch is housing,” Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee said Friday. He is shown above at The Wall Street Journal Global Food Forum in Chicago in June. Photo: Kevin Sikorski for The Wall Street JournalInflation seems on track toward the Federal Reserve’s 2% target and now the big question is what will happen with housing in 2024, a top Fed official said Friday. “It was absolutely where we wanted it to be,” Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee said of the government’s latest inflation data.

Mallinckrodt didn’t admit or deny the SEC’s findings. Photo: Whitney Curtis/Associated PressThe U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said Mallinckrodt failed to tell investors it had potentially overcharged Medicaid for its flagship drug, but the regulator waived a $40 million civil penalty partly because the pharmaceutical company agreed to hire a compliance consultant. The SEC said in an administrative proceeding Thursday that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services informed Mallinckrodt as early as 2016 that the company was using an incorrect rebate rate for its sales of Acthar Gel, a drug used to treat several rare autoimmune diseases, which meant it was overcharging state Medicaid programs for the drug.

Journal Editorial Report: College presidents are talking tolerance, but few take action. Images: Getty Images Composite: Mark KellyWar is back against Hamas, but will the Biden Administration let Israel win? Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered the bad news to Jerusalem before the truce ended: He wants Israel on a short leash. Hamas fired rockets at Israel Friday morning, in violation of the pause, and failed to produce the remaining female hostages to trade for more time and terrorists. It also claimed that its last child hostages, 10-month-old Kfir Bibas and his four-year-old brother, Ariel, are dead.

King Charles’s response to the latest commotion surrounding the British monarch has been to continue to keep quiet and turn up at public events. Photo: cameron smith/Agence France-Presse/Getty ImagesLONDON—Allegations of racism in the British monarchy were again thrust into the public domain this week after a translation of a book claimed that King Charles and Catherine, Princess of Wales, were the mystery royals who had allegedly discussed concerns about the skin color of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry ’s son before his birth. The claim was made in a Dutch translation of “Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy’s Fight for Survival,” which was quickly pulled by the publishers who said the names had appeared in error. On Friday, virtually every major British newspaper and broadcaster revealed the names.

Nick Drake in 1969. Photo: Estate Of Keith Morris/RedfernsThe wistful, haunted English singer-songwriter Nick Drake (1948-74) had one of the strangest careers in the history of pop music, almost all of it posthumous. Grab a Copy Nick Drake: The Life By Richard Morton Jack Hachette Books 576 pages We may earn a commission when you buy products through the links on our site. Buy Book Amazon Barnes & Noble Books a Million BookshopFor the first quarter-century after Drake’s death—at age 26, from a drug overdose—his three difficult-to-find LPs were cherished by tiny groups of listeners who loved his gentle, ghostly voice, his distinctive mixture of folk and jazz stylings, and his elliptical lyrics. These qualities combined to evoke a sense of profound—and increasingly unreachable—melancholy, yet the best songs were also so seductively pretty that they were curiously soothing.

George Santos exhibited a distinct fashion sense during his months in Congress. Photo: Jabin Botsford/Getty ImagesGeorge Santos knew how to make an exit. “The hell with this place,” the New York Republican declared to a scrum of reporters after his expulsion Friday from the House over allegations that he stole money from his own campaign and committed other misdeeds. He was just the sixth House member expelled and the first who wasn’t a convicted felon or a supporter of the Confederacy.

E-commerce platform Shopify said its merchants hit a sales record. Photo: David Kawai/Bloomberg NewsThe Score is a weekly review of the biggest stock moves and the news that drove them. ShopifyBlack Friday and Cyber Monday brought in big sales for online shopping firms.

For nearly a quarter-century, Sandra Day O’Connor , who died Friday at age 93, was perhaps the most powerful woman in America, often casting the deciding vote when her Supreme Court colleagues divided 4-4 along ideological lines. Her decisions on issues including abortion, affirmative action, voting rights and the line between church and state often reflected a pragmatic middle ground that frequently aligned with mainstream public opinion. O’Connor’s retirement in 2006 sent the court in a new direction. Republican presidents selected justices devoted to formal theories that seek constitutional fealty regardless of contemporary social values. Where O’Connor took each case as it came, today’s majority views the litigation before it as part of a larger struggle over the Constitution’s meaning.

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