• The Year Nothing Worked: Stocks, Bonds, Cash Go Nowhere (BBG)
• Oil falls toward $37, near 11-year low, as excess supply weighs (Reuters)
• End of easy money for mini-refiners splitting U.S. shale? (Reuters)
• Shale's Running Out of Survival Tricks as OPEC Ramps Up Pressure (Reuters)
• 'Safe’ Puerto Rican Debt Stirs Worries (WSJ)
• These Will Be Wall Street's Most In-Demand Jobs Next Year (BBG)

The phenomenon of “The Donald” is rooted in a psyche far deeper and more consequential than next November’s presidential election. His support denotes an abiding distrust in - and disrespect for - the governing elite. These individuals do not like being told by Washington or Wall Street what is best for them, do not like the direction America is headed in, and disdain President Barack Obama and his (perceived) circle of self-righteous, tone-deaf governing partisans. Trump voters are not just angry - they want revenge.

Because we squandered our opportunity to correct our own problems, our problems shall be our legacy. It’s wretched how dumb we are in our greed to have everything right now in the cheapest way possible and how willing we are to force the debts of that consumption upon our grandchildren and to pretend that won’t hurt them. We live in economic denial.

Along with the currencies of most other commodity-exporting countries, the Canadian dollar has been in near-freefall lately. Gold, meanwhile, has been sucked down with the rest of the commodities complex, falling hard since 2013. But only in US dollars. For Canadians, with their weak domestic currency, gold has been behaving just fine. It’s up 17% in C$ terms over the past two years and looks ready to rally from here. Protection from currency trouble is why people own it, and why in the vast majority of places it’s owners are very happy.

With recent JPY strength not helping, last week ended on a down-note for Japan as its jobless rate ticked up from 3.1% to 3.3% (the biggest rise since January) and Household spending collapsed. However, as the last week of the year begins, things have not improved as a double whammy of awfulness just hit the shores of Abe's nation with retail sales (worst since the tsunami) and industrial production ugly and missing across the board. We are sure, of course, that just one more dose of faith-based QE will fix this.

Christmas is a time for giving and that is what Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne is asking of her citizenry. With almost $300 billion in debt, and almost 1 in 10 dollars of revenue going to pay interest, and already facing the highest tax rates in North America, The Star reports that Ontario officials are asking that 'patriots' voluntarily donate their tax refund or write a cheque to defray the province's massive debtload.

Evil corporate America meets oppressive police state: “When we received word of potential strikes and disruptive activity on Black Friday 2012, that’s when we started to ask the ARC to work with us. ARC had contracted with Lockheed leading up to Black Friday to help source open social media sites.”