Jobs Report Friday, again. Here’s what we’re looking for in the numbers and why economists are generally optimistic about these pre-Omicron figures - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and MarketWatch

Count Thursday as a top-of-the-rollercoaster session for markets, with stocks rallying and “recovering some of their losses from drops earlier in the week” - NYTimes and MarketWatch

The very-active FTC has filed a lawsuit to block Nvidia’s “$40 billion acquisition of fellow chip company, Arm, halting what would be the biggest semiconductor industry deal in history”—the latest in its recent moves targeting corporate consolidation - NYTimes and WSJ and Law360 and Bloomberg

Good news for those who support keeping the lights on, as Congress agreed late last night to fund the government through mid-February - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and MarketWatch

Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing revealed this morning that it will begin the process of delisting from the New York Stock Exchange, just months after a summer IPO on the NYSE that valued the company at nearly $70 billion. That quick about-face—undoubtedly pushed by Beijing—is “likely to anger investors, who bid up the price of the company this summer when it listed” - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg and MarketWatch and TechCrunch

Despite pressure from its best customers and threats to open national strategic oil reserves, OPEC closed its virtual meeting on Thursday with a commitment to largely stay the course with its “previously agreed-to program of gradually adding oil to the market,” though they promised to “monitor the market and ‘make immediate adjustments if required’” to assuage frustrated consumers - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg

Recent privacy protections from Apple and Google aimed at preventing companies from hoovering up consumer data in the shadows have prompted outfits across “nearly every sector . . . to collect their own information on consumers, seeking to build millions of detailed customer profiles” in an effort to keep online ad targeting humming - WSJ

Big changes afoot for the United Automobile Workers, whose union members voted “decisively to change the way they choose their president and other top leaders, opting to select them through a direct vote rather than a vote of delegates to a convention.” The change was a pet project of union reformers who have “long backed the one member, one vote approach” - NYTimes

3 weeks out, folks. Surely you wouldn’t mind a bit of help with those stocking stuffers for the little ones - NYTimes

Stay safe, get boosted, and have a great weekend,

MDR