| The U.S. has cleared its first two Covid-19 treatment pills. Now comes the hard part: deciding who should get one. Merck’s molnupiravir was authorized Thursday by the Food and Drug Administration for use in some infected adults at high risk of severe illness. The U.S. will soon have 3 million courses of it available. Meanwhile, Pfizer’s Paxlovid, authorized earlier this week, showed stronger clinical trial data. But it will only be available in limited quantities at first, as Pfizer takes months to ramp up manufacturing. Regulators are signaling they prefer Pfizer’s pill, but concede Merck’s drug is better than nothing. Regardless, availability may depend on which state you live in. —David E. Rovella Bloomberg is tracking the coronavirus pandemic and the progress of global vaccination efforts. The omicron variant’s case rate has now exceeded the worst days of the first delta-fueled wave, and more cities and countries are imposing precautions. But there’s more research showing it to be less severe than previous mutations. That said, two doses and a booster of the vaccine most widely used around the world isn’t enough to fight off omicron. China’s Sinovac shot didn’t produce sufficient levels of neutralizing antibodies, research found. Another study however showed a third dose of AstraZeneca’s vaccine, like that of Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, significantly boosts protection against the variant. Here’s the latest on the pandemic. China formed a rare-earths giant by merging some key producers, creating a behemoth that will strengthen its control over the global industry it has dominated for decades.  The U.S. has been trying to develop more rare-earth mining capacity in the face of Chinese domination of the industry. Above, the Mountain Pass mine operated by MP Materials in California. Photographer: Joe Buglewicz/Bloomberg That crazy stock market is back to breaking records again. Equities rose to a new high on speculation the ongoing recovery from last year’s pandemic recession can survive the omicron wave. On Thursday, electric-vehicle startup Nikola surged amid optimism about deliveries. U.S.-listed shares of JD.com sank on news that Tencent planned to distribute $16 billion of its stock as a dividend. Here’s your markets wrap.
Regulators rejected a pair of proposals to offer physically-backed Bitcoin exchange-traded funds, handing crypto enthusiasts a bag of coal ahead of the Christmas holiday. U.S. President Joe Biden indicated he would support changing Senate filibuster rules to enact voting rights legislation as a last resort, though currently there aren’t enough votes to do so. The landmark bill is almost universally opposed by Senate Republicans and even a few conservative Democrats. With Republicans rewriting state laws across the country to restrict voting access while empowering GOP officials in states they control to oversee election results, democracy advocates are warning that the fairness of many American elections may be in jeopardy. Biden on Thursday signed into law a bill banning goods from China’s Xinjiang region unless companies can prove they aren’t made with forced labor. The crackdown on this key link in the global supply chain comes in reaction to Beijing’s longstanding oppression and mass imprisonment of the nation’s Muslim Uyghur minority. Inflation in the U.S. has been rising at the fastest pace in decades. But ask consumers across political parties where prices are headed in the near future, and you’ll get entirely different outlooks. If you’re making a list of people you most want to mix you a drink this holiday season, Lynnette Marrero should be at the top. Marrero is the winner of the Altos Bartenders’ Bartender Award, part of the World’s Best Bars celebration, which took place in London on Dec. 7. The award is the result of votes from the drinkmakers at the top 50 bars. Here’s what’s at the top of her list. Like getting the Evening Briefing? Subscribe to Bloomberg.com for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and gain expert analysis from exclusive subscriber-only newsletters. Have a financial dilemma or a nagging money question? The Bloomberg Wealth team wants to hear from you. Send your query to bbgwealth@bloomberg.net and we might just answer it in the Wealth newsletter, which you can sign up for here. | 
