By Not Running for President, Michael Bloomberg Is Now the Obi-Wan Kenobi of Democrats (New York Observer)
While Trump has the Russian Internet Research Agency in his corner, now the Dems have Bloomberg, the guy who brought global financial markets into the modern age. It’s as if Trump thought he was the smart guy by bringing a gun to a knife fight only to discover that the Dems showed up with an RPG-7.

Flashback to 2012: Michael Bloomberg Challenges America’s Mayors to Come Up with Good, Replicable Ideas (The Economist)
Cory Booker, Newark’s then-mayor, told Esquire magazine in 2012 that Mike Bloomberg is “the Obi-Wan Kenobi to all of us young Jedi knights.”

Brexit Countdown:
-Theresa May Weighing Options for Tuesday Vote (Bloomberg)
-What’s Next for Brexit: A Deal, Soft Brexit or Reversal (Bloomberg)

Hot on the Bloomberg:
Boeing in Crisis as Second 737 Max Crash in Months Grounds Flights in China, Indonesia and Ethiopia (Bloomberg)
Shares slid as much as 13%, the most in intraday trading since September 2001.
-Which Airlines Fly the Boeing 737 Max? (Bloomberg QuickTake)

Slowdown Watch: Global Economy Hits Its Weakest Spell Since Financial Crisis (Bloomberg)
The global economy’s sharp loss of speed through 2018 has left the pace of expansion the weakest since the global financial crisis a decade ago, according to Bloomberg Economics.

Venezuela Blackout: No End in Sight to Venezuela’s Blackout, Experts Warn (New York Times)

Florida Today: Massage Parlor Magnate Helped Steer Chinese to Trump NYC Fundraiser, Attendee Says (Miami Herald)

Tech Today: Uber and Travis Kalanick Are in Business Again. This Time, as Competitors (Bloomberg)
Uber is testing a program in Paris, where it rents kitchen space to restaurants using its food-delivery app as Kalanick’s own startup expands its main business of renting kitchen space.

Gun Safety Progress: New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham Enacts Expanded Gun Background Checks (Associated Press)
At the bill signing, the governor criticized opposition against the measure and other proposed gun reforms as being part of a national “misinformation campaign.”

Study: States with Stricter Gun Control Regulations have Fewer Mass Shootings (The Hill)

Retirement Gift of the Year: Bond King Bill Gross Receives Lifetime Bloomberg Subscription from Mike Bloomberg (Financial Times – subscription)
From Axios AM’s 1 Fun Thing: As a retirement gift, Mike Bloomberg personally gave Gross a free Bloomberg login — $24,000 a year — for life, per the Financial Times. Gross, who reinvented the concept of bond investing, “now plans to spend his time playing golf, in philanthropy and managing his $390M foundation and a personal fortune estimated at about $1.5B.” “I didn’t want to lose my Bloombergs,” Gross told the FT.

Best of late night.

On Paul Manafort’s prison sentence:
“Manafort will receive a second jail sentence from a different federal judge for witness tampering and money laundering. You know you’re in trouble when the only time you get out of jail is to go get sentenced to more jail.”
— Stephen Colbert

On the 2020 Presidential candidate field:
“I can’t get used to this: everyday I wake up now, every single day, someone has either announced they are running for President, or they’ve made a big announcement that they are not running for President. It didn’t used to be the case. It’s just that now so many people are running, that you have to physically announce that you are not running for President. It’s very strange.”
— Conan O’Brien

On Mike Bloomberg’s announcement that he is not running for President in 2020:
“It’s too bad he’s not running though. I was looking forward to Bloomberg’s campaign slogan: ‘I actually am a billionaire.’”
— Conan O’Brien