“Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future” — John F. Kennedy.

1. FCC rolls out net neutrality rules — the FCC voted 3-to-2 in favor of launching net neutrality rules, which would go into effect early next year.
2. Bullishness Hits a Fresh High — Investor’s Intelligence survey on Dec 22 showed a fresh high bullish reading of 58.8%. This is the highest reading since the second week of October 2007 – just one week shy of the all-time market high of 1565 on the S&P 500.

3. Ireland to inject $4.9 billion into AIB — The Irish government on Thursday effectively nationalized Allied Irish Banks PLC after the nation’s High Court approved the finance ministry’s request to allow it to inject an additional 3.7 billion euros ($4.9 billion) of capital into the troubled lender.
4. China auto shares sputter as car policy unveiled — investors reacted to the Beijing municipal government’s new, aggressive measures to address traffic congestion by curbing growth in car ownership.
Officials are planning to issue about 240,000 new vehicle licenses next year, compared to 700,000 registered so far this year, Zhou Zhengyu, deputy secretary-general of the Beijing municipal government, told reporters Thursday.

The week ahead — Economic data from Econoday.com: