Apologies for all my calls for a more wintry winter. Now the icy north winds are blowing and poor robin is hiding her head under her wings.

One of my British relatives is making history. As long-term readers know, my nephew, Joe Cornish, four years ago made a movie, Attack the Block. Its star, John Loyega, played Moses, a juvenile delinquent who rescues a London council estate (housing project) from an alien invasion.

Now the British actor who played the teen-age hero is starring as the renegade Finn in The Force Awakens, the new Disney Star Wars movie.

As everyone gets set for a holiday, only central banks are still busy. The Bank of Korea, of South Korea, hinted that it would be more likely to cut interest rates from the current 1.5% next year. Perversely, the signal for easing was that it lowered its inflation target, in theory meaning it would be quicker to raise rates if the world were operating normally. But getting to its inflation target of 2% will in fact require lower interest rates. What this means for our stocks is explained for paid subscribers below.

Also active is the central bank of China. It imposed new rules on insurance companies which may explain why the head of Hong Kong's Fosun International was detained last week for questioning, before being released. China also extended the hours of trading renminbi to overlap with European markets. The recent 4% rise in Shanghai shares was credited to insurers buying heavily. This too affects our shares.

Global Investing articles in 2016 will be appearing on Thomson-Reuters with links to our partner www.talkmarkets.com in which your editor has invested, under a deal just inked by the two firms.

Fund Fundamentals

*The likelihood of easing in South Korea naturally will help its stocks, and make an argument for patiently owning Korea Fund, KF as well as Shinhan Finance, (SHG), a bank.

*Pershing Square Holdings (PSHZF) net asset value hit $21.23 when the share traded at only $20.46. This activist closed-end fund is behaving more like others after problems with some of its big bets.

Extraction

*The Chinese insurance crackdown is affecting Israeli deals in the sector. While it is not alone, the confused state of the third attempted sale of Phoenix Group to Fosun by Delek Group (DGRLY) may lead to cash shortages as DGRLY, a conglomerate switching to energy projects, prepares to deliver Tamar field gas to the Dolphinus Co. of Egypt. Approvals allow 5 bn cubic meters to be supplied, giving Delek NIS 1 bn/yr over the next 3 years. While Israel has approved the deal despite earlier indications that it would not allow it, Egypt has yet to agree and pay a forfeit toIEC (Israel Electric Co.) for the gas. And then both must pay to reverse the trans-Sinai pipeline. Meanwhile negotiations are on with Turkey over delivering Israeli gas there, after a 3 year diplomatic hiatus. It is lucky that these countries work over Christmas. But with insurance deals in Israel going wrong, not just at Delek, money may be short. Delek first sold to an Argentine operators and then to Donald Trump's son-in-law, but both deals did not pass muster with the Israeli insurance overseer.

*Someone calling him- or herself “Alpha Investor” wrote on Seekingalpha.com that Cameco (CCJ), the Canada uranium miner, is the top 2016 pick. If energy or raw materials prices recover next year, the loony could pick up against the greenback, boosting CCJ.

*Also tipping Canada Nieman Funds' Dan Nieman from LA tipped another stock in our portfolio, Agrium (AGU), a fertilizer maker, going more into the whole trio of plant foods. AGU.

*My recommendation for Veresen (FCGYF) was reprinted by wallstreetsbestdividendstocks.com, the new name of dickdavisdividenddigest which we have worked with since this newsletter started up a quarter century ago. VSN-Toronto was the ticker symbol its editor used, as it is more liquid in Canada than in the US where it trades as FCGYF. While it has a high 12% yield in loonies this share is high-risk and nobody should put all their money into it. It is building a gas liquefaction plant in Jordan Cove, OR.

Bankers

*Banco Santander named Chris Sullivan its deputy CEO for the UK which led to some negativism in The Times recently about this experienced banker. Mr Sullivan allegedly gave “willfully obtuse testimony” two years ago to a parliamentary select committee on the Treasury over how his employer, Royal Bank of Scotland, had imposed hidden charges and fees on small businesses, in some cases causing their bankruptcy. The UK newspaper is outraged but there are many bankers who did the same.

Software

*DeNA of Japan is on track to develop phone applications with its partner, Nintendo, according to interviews with NTDOY and DNACF in the Wall St. Journal. The companies expect to meet their March 2016 deadline for launching several games using Nintendo's Mitome application for smartphones with DeNA's Mobage platform, not just one, according to DeNA CEO Isao Moriyasa. He says this reduces the risk if one game doesn't appeal.

The WSJ says investors are impatient to know more details on the jv, like whether old DeNA figures like the original “Super Mario” (who was Japanese, not Italian) will be on cellphones. Under the jv put in place by the late Satoru Iwata of NTDOY early last year before he died, Nintendo took a 10% stake in much smaller DeNA and DeNA got 1.24% of Nintendo in exchange.

DNACF stock moves as vigorously as its old exercise games do, and there is no reason to exit given the new clout it has with a Japanese major. It is impossible to tell if the technology will win clients but given the marketing nous of both firms I expect it will.

Pharmaceuticals

*Australia will cover all holders of its Medicaid card with hepatitis C drugs from Gilead (GILD) and Bristol Myers (BMY) despite the often eye-watering charges. Insured Ozzies will pay only A$37.70 for drugs costing thousands of dollars. In fact the Australian health system will negotiate the prices down as did the French. US law currently prohibits insurers from demanding discounts for volume orders for patented drugs.

While this is good for Australians its is bad for our hepatitis C play from Down Under. Benitec Biopharma is in phase II trials of its gene therapy against hep C which uses DNA-directed RNA interference to keep the virus from doing damage in infected people. But the US FDA trials are working on a steady increase in dosage to be sure that the dd-RNAi doesn't hurt patients, expected only to conclude a year from now. I think this is why the Australian CEO was sacked last month along with other issues.

*A costly attempt to head off the diabetes double-play of Danish Novo Nordisk (NVO) by Sanofi (SNY) of France was described by FiercePharma in a newsletter. By buying an FDA “coupon” for $245 mn from a drug developer small cap firm, SNY got to the front of the queue for getting the US regulatory to examine its LitLan which combines insulin with a GLP-1 booster of the body's own ability to control blood sugar. A similar combination has already been put before the FDA in Sept. from NVO combining Victoza and a GLP-1 biologic, to be called Xultophy, already available in some European markets. The coupon system forces the FDA to give priority to a drug it might otherwise delay examining, but it does not stop the regulator from examining alternatives.

*GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has added a top biologics expert to its board, Jesse Goodman, now a professor at Georgetown Medical School. Dr Goodman formerly was chief scientist and head of he Center for Biologics at the US FDA. GSK is British.

*Alkermes (ALKS) continues to appeal more to investors than to insiders. The latest seller of all the stock he picked up was Shane Cook, head of the US arm of now Irish ALKS.