• ☝️ 🚀 SpaceX completed a sixth test flight of Starship, the largest and most powerful rocket ever built, but aborted an attempt to catch the booster with giant mechanical arms, which succeeded in flight #5; the company said Starship ignited one of its Raptor engines successfully while in space for the first time.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

in partnership with Tuft & Needle

• 💰 US markets closed mixed (S&P: +0.4%; Dow: -0.3%; Nasdaq: +1.0%).
• 💪 Walmart reported strong Q3 results boosted by higher discretionary spending from households making $100,000/year.
• 🎧 Bose is purchasing McIntosh, the storied maker of high-end luxury audio equipment. | 🍔🤝 ✈️ Shake Shack + Delta: The two companies are partnering to bring the former's burgers to the latter's first-class customers. | 📺 Comcast is spinning off its NBCUniversal cable TV networks, which includes MSNBC, CNBC, USA, E!, Syfy, and the Golf Channel.

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SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• 📰📲 1 in 5 Americans say they regularly get their news from “news influencers” on social media, per a new Pew Research study; that includes 37% of adults under 30, the largest share of any age group.
• 📱 Bluesky, the X/Threads competitor, recently passed 20 million users (though it's unclear whether that figure is daily, monthly, active, etc.); Threads reached 275+ million monthly active users this month.
• ⚾🏆 MLB Awards Week: The AL/NL Manager of the Year and AL/NL Rookie of the Year were announced this week; Cy Young winners are today, while league MVPs will be announced tomorrow. | 🏈 The New York Jets fired general manager Joe Douglas after five seasons with the franchise. (JETS: Just End The Season)

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

in partnership with Cornbread Hemp

• 🗣️ Microsoft Teams announced an upcoming AI-powered translation tool that allows users to speak or listen in the language of their choosing during meetings.
• 🚀🌕 NASA tapped SpaceX and Blue Origin to provide lunar landers that would deliver large pieces of equipment and infrastructure to the Moon’s surface; the assignments fall under NASA’s existing human landing-system contracts.
• 🦠 Human fat cells carry a “memory” of obesity even after drastic weight-loss, per a new study; the results could explain why many people find it hard to keep weight off after losing it.

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MISCELLANEOUS

• 🏛️ President-elect Trump nominated TV personality Dr. Mehmet Oz to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services; Trump also nominated former Rep. Sean Duffy (R-WI) as his transportation secretary, former WWE CEO Linda McMahon as education secretary, and Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick as commerce secretary.
• ✂️🌐 A pair of undersea communication cables linking Germany to Finland were recently severed in the Baltic Sea; US allies, including Germany, called the incident an act of sabotage targeting European countries who support Ukraine’s war against Russia.
• 🏛️ A witness told the House Ethics Committee she saw former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) have sex with a 17-year-old girl at a party in 2017, while he was serving in Congress, per the witness’ lawyer; the House committee was expected to release a report on its investigation into Gaetz last week, but didn’t do so after Gaetz resigned from Congress to pursue the attorney general nomination offered by President-elect Trump. (From the Left | From the Center | From the Right)

CLICKBAIT

• 🥇🎙️ Apple’s most popular podcasts of 2024.