President Donald Trump insisted on Congressional funding a wall or other barrier along the southern U.S. border as tensions over a possible partial government shutdown intensified. Without an agreement to fund the government by midnight Friday, nine departments including Homeland Security will close just before the Christmas holiday. Tomorrow should be interesting. —Josh Petri

Here are today's top stories

Stocks slid as markets digested the latest rate hike and renewed risk of a government shutdown. The Nasdaq is on the brink of bear territory. U.S. stocks are now more volatile than their emerging market peers. 

Special Counsel Robert Mueller may be cautious about implicating President Donald Trump in criminal activity over the next few months. 

The U.S. Justice Department announced charges that Chinese officials coordinated a decade-long espionage campaign to steal intellectual property and other data from dozens of U.S. companies.

Dallas Mavericks employees are allegedly behind the NBA's biggest #MeToo era scandal. New chief executive Cynthia Marshall is cleaning up the mess, Bloomberg Businessweek reports.

Meet the new aristocrats of debt—the people and companies cashing in on a record boom in, yes, collateralized loan obligations. These once-marginal investments have fueled a rapid buildup in corporate debt that some think could become the epicenter of the next credit crisis. 

In a few decades, climate change may have punched a hole through the busiest stretch of rail in North America. As if Amtrak wasn't slow enough.

What's Joe Weisenthal thinking about? There was no way the Fed was going to satisfy markets with its rate hike, the Bloomberg news director said. The blood on the floor Thursday proved that.

What you'll need to know tomorrow

• Alphabet is spinning off an energy project with billionaire investors.
• The JFK and Marilyn Monroe "tryst" house is on sale for $5 million.
• Tesla has spawned a German rival.
• Drones forced Gatwick airport to shut down.
• Amazon keeps stumbling in the $840 billion grocery market.
• Altria paid $12.8 billion for a stake in E-cigarette maker Juul.
• How Huawei could divide the world.

What you'll want to read tonight

The Best Cars We Drove in 2018

Sometimes in life, we have to face difficult truths. Here's one: Hannah Elliott has a better job than you do. She gets to drive the newest, fastest and most expensive motorized vehicles on Earth. You (likely) do not. Here were her favorite rides of the last year.

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