{"id":205047,"date":"2020-12-26T10:47:51","date_gmt":"2020-12-26T15:47:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/?p=205047"},"modified":"2020-12-29T12:58:48","modified_gmt":"2020-12-29T17:58:48","slug":"markets-climb-before-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/markets-climb-before-christmas\/","title":{"rendered":"Markets climb before Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It was the trading day before Christmas, and despite whirlwinds in Europe, Beijing and Washington, North American markets inched up. On Thursday, Britain and the U.K. finally signed a trade deal to truly complete <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/uk-politics-32810887\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Brexit<\/a> and avoid widespread tariffs for British consumers. Meanwhile, <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/BABA-N\">Alibaba<\/a> and other Chinese tech titans were slammed as Beijing&#8217;s war with BABA CEO, Jack Ma, heated up, like Washington taking aim at <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/GOOG-Q\">Google<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/META-Q\">Facebook<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2020\/12\/24\/tech\/alibaba-china-antitrust-investigation\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Beijing<\/a> is launching an anti-trust probe of Alibaba. In short, Jack Ma has not been shy in criticizing the Communist government which is biting back.<\/p>\n<p>BABA shares were hammered 13.34%. As of the 1:00 pm close, House Republicans blocked <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/us-policy\/2020\/12\/24\/house-stimulus-checks-trump\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Trump<\/a>&#8216;s idea to increase stimulus checks to Americans. Trump threatens to veto the long-awaited stimulus bill.<\/p>\n<p>Despite that, the main American indices closed 0.24%-0.36% higher, though the Russell 2000 gave back -0.16% after hitting new highs the day before. The TSX saw more modest gains, up 0.19% as energy stocks lagged. Year-to-date, the Nasdaq has soared 42.71% while the TSX has inched up 3.28%, largely held back by energy. However, <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/TA-T\">TransAlta<\/a> leapt 6.52% higher Thursday after it announced it was shifting assets to TransAlta Renewables, itself popping 6.52%, raising the dividend and enjoying an analyst upgrade. Telcos, real estate and staples rallied. The price of WTI ticked up slightly, while WCS declined nearly 0.5%.<\/p>\n<p>Stockchase wishes you and your loved ones a safe and happy holidays. If possible, please support a local business. Joyeux No\u00ebl &amp; Feliz Navidad!<\/p>\n<p>&#x1f6cd; <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/BABA-N\">Alibaba Group Holding<\/a> +13.34%<br \/>\n&#x26a1; <a href=\"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/TA-T\">Transalta Corp<\/a> +6.52%<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It was the trading day before Christmas, and despite whirlwinds in Europe, Beijing and Washington, North American markets inched up. On Thursday, Britain and the U.K. finally signed a trade deal to truly complete Brexit and avoid widespread tariffs for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":174836,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cwp_meta_box_check":"No","cwp_rev_product_name":"","cwp_rev_product_image":"","wppr_links":[],"cwp_rev_price":"","wppr_options":[],"wppr_pros":[],"wppr_cons":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[178],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-205047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily"],"wppr_data":{"cwp_meta_box_check":"No"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stockchase.com\/discover\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}