💸 The Santa nosedive

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The Santa rally just got run over by a reindeer. Plus: The story of a wealthy fashion heir trying to adopt his middle-aged employee in order to financially screw over the charity he started. Seriously. Let's get into it.

By Allison Morrow

Dow	37,082.00	1.27%
S&P 500	4,698.35	1.47%
NASDAQ	14,777.94	1.50%

Last updated December 20 at 6:59 PM ET

📉 OOPSIE

Wednesdays, amirite? (Source: Giphy)

What. Just. Happened.

If you weren't watching Wall Street today, allow us to catch you up while we also catch our breath.

For no obvious reason, the S&P 500, the broadest measure of the stock market, abruptly tumbled Wednesday afternoon, starting just after 2 pm ET. It had been on pace to hit a record — its first in nearly two years, my colleague David Goldman writes.

Within minutes, the index was down half a percentage point. Within an hour, it had fallen more than 1%, and it ended the day down nearly 1.5%.

The Dow, which had been up nearly 100 points, ended the day almost 500 points lower.

The VIX volatility index spiked more than 7% Wednesday before falling back somewhat. CNN's Fear and Greed Index, which was firmly in "Extreme Greed" territory to start the day, fell back into the "Greed" zone by end the day.

Don't panic.

As Dave explains, this kind of volatility isn't unusual in the last few weeks of the year. Traders are mostly on vacation, or getting ready to be. That ultra-low trading volume often leads to so-called Santa Claus rallies, in which markets surge at the end of the year when fewer people are paying close attention.

Despite the selloff, there was "nothing really new from a narrative perspective as things continue to slow into the holidays and year-end," FactSet said in a note to traders. There was "no clear spark for today's drop."

Low trading volume can also mean high volatility.

If you're a trader who's been riding the recent Santa rally, you might be inclined to take those recent gains, stuff them in your pockets and jump and head on up to Greenwich for the holiday.

There's plenty of precedent for this.

December 15, 2022: The Dow plunged 765 points for no real reason at all. Some market analysts cited "recession fears," which ended up unfounded.
December 30, 2019: The Dow sank 200 points. CNN Business' story at the time noted the day was "relatively devoid of news."
But the mother of all end-of-year market chaos moments happened in a 10-day stretch to end 2018, when the Dow sank 4,000 points before staging one of the best days on record — a 1,086-point gain — before a roller coaster day the next trading day, which nearly wiped out all those gains.

So as we wind down 2023, here's a tip for all of us, investors and non-investors alike: Take a deep breath. It wouldn't be the holiday season without some bumps in the road.

NUMBER OF THE DAY

$499

The dating app Tinder is now offering a $499 monthly — yes, monthly — subscription option via an exclusive, invitation-only process.

The $6,000-a-year subscription is called Tinder Select, and it gives users more prominent placement to be seen by its "most sought after profiles," among other perks. Getting to that elite tier involves an application and adherence to a Tinder-directed standard on your profile. If you clear those hurdles, you get the privilege of shelling out — and I can't stress this enough — five hundred literal US dollars a month.

💸 RICH FAMILY DRAMA

Picture this: In a quiet Swiss Alpine town lives an 80-year-old reclusive heir to one of Europe's richest families who is scheming to formally adopt a middle-aged man who works for him in order to cut a charitable foundation out of his will.

That is not a storyline taken from a Netflix pitch. It's ripped straight from actual Swiss headlines.

Here's the deal: Nicolas Puech is a fifth-generation descendant of the founder of French fashion house Hermes. He has no known children, and he is sitting on an estimated $13 billion fortune.

Earlier this month, Swiss newspapers reported that Puech had begun the process of severing ties with the charitable foundation he founded, the Isocrates Foundation, and was moving to legally adopt his middle-aged gardener.

Now, the foundation is challenging the effort, saying that "a unilateral cancellation of the contract of inheritance seems void and unfounded."

CNN has contacted Puech's lawyer for comment.

As for the gardener, there's a lot we don't know. He isn't identified by name in the Swiss papers, one of which referred to him as a 51-year-old from a "modest Moroccan family."

The Isocrates Foundation, established and funded by Puech, supports public interest journalism and civil society organizations working toward a "healthy digital public space," according to its website.

The inheritance contract between the foundation and Puech reportedly provides for his Hermes shares to be left to the organization. That is, unless he becomes a father, in which case his child would be entitled to part of the inheritance.

Puech owns an estimated 5.7% of Hermes, the company known for its silk scarves and leather handbags. A post-pandemic boom in demand for luxury goods has propelled Hermes to a valuation of nearly roughly $231 billion.

To be honest, the story might be too wild for Hollywood.

My colleague Hanna Ziady has more.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

📺 The heads of Warner Bros. Discovery, CNN's parent company, and Paramount Global met this week to discuss a potential merger between the two companies, two people familiar with the matter said.

🚲 Bird, the scooter- and bicycle-sharing company, filed for bankruptcy on Wednesday, with the aim to sell its United States operations.

📡 SiriusXM is being sued for allegedly trapping customers in unwanted subscriptions

🚗 Toyota is recalling about 1 million cars and SUVs in the United States due to a possible defect that could cause the passenger airbag to fail to deploy in a crash.

📈 US consumer confidence improved for the third consecutive month, leaping to its highest level since July, thanks to a strong job market and a sturdy business climate, according to new data from the Conference Board.