Your Evening Briefing

Josh Petri

21 Dec 2019, 03:45 AM IST

(Bloomberg) --

House Democrats who argued that President Donald Trump’s impeachment was a matter of urgent national interest are now being forced to defend House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s delay in handing the case over to the Senate for trial, though no one expected anything to happen until January anyway. The Constitution doesn’t specify how quickly the articles must be sent. Impeached or not, Trump has accepted Pelosi’s invitation to deliver the State of the Union.

Here are today’s top stories

U.S. Steel will shut down most of its facility near Detroit, lay off 1,545 workers and slash its dividend. The company has been facing slowing demand even as it enjoyed the protection of Trump’s trade war. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross says the tariffs are working.

Spark Alliance is a mysterious group that helps bail Hong Kong democracy protesters out of jail. On Thursday, police announced the arrests of four people connected with with the group.

Boeing’s Starliner crew capsule failed to reach the International Space Station on its debut flight after burning too much fuel. The company’s woes continued on Earth as well: United Airlines has given up on flying the grounded 737 Max until June, two months longer than rival U.S. carriers.

Apple has a secret team working on satellites and related wireless technology, striving to find new ways to beam data directly to its devices.

We took silly personality quizzes on Facebook, bought phones that tracked our locations and allowed smart speakers to send recordings of our most intimate moments to tech giants. This was the decade tech turned dystopian, and we are all complicit.

American Airlines and Citigroup are canceling reward trips and seizing miles in a crackdown on customers who take advantage of the carrier's loyalty program by opening multiple accounts.

What’s Luke Kawa thinking about? The Bloomberg cross-asset reporter says one of the biggest fears for portfolio managers in 2019 was possibly having to tear up the asset-allocation playbook—the idea that bonds won’t provide an effective offset to stocks in risk-off episodes. That fear turned out to be unfounded. A basic 60/40 portfolio is enjoying its best year since 1998.

What you’ll need to know tomorrow

Critics of ‘Cats’ say the film is a dog. “Oh god, my eyes,” wrote one.
Slip out the back, Jack: Fifty ways to leave your hedge fund.
Joe Biden turned in his best performance yet at Democratic debate.
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai got a $242 million pay package.
Motorola delayed the launch of its foldable Razr smartphone.
The food trends top chefs and bartenders hated last year.
If a black card is too plain, perhaps you'd like a gem-encrusted one?

What you’ll want to read tonight in Businessweek

The attack against Liberia began in October 2016. More than a half-million security cameras around the world tried to connect to a handful of servers used by a local mobile phone operator, overwhelming the network. Internet access for its 1.5 million customers slowed to a crawl, then stopped. It was the biggest attack of its kind ever witnessed. Eventually, authorities tracked the hacks back to one man who found regular jobs tough, but corporate espionage easy.