Fly Intel: Top five weekend stock stories

Catch up on the weekend's top five stories with this list compiled by The Fly: 1. S&P Global (SPGI) is in advanced talks to acquire IHS Markit (INFO) for about $44B, The Wall Street Journal's Cara Lombardo and Liz Hoffman reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The deal could be announced as soon as Monday, the people said. 2. HSBC (HSBC) is weighing up a complete exit from retail banking in the U.S. after narrowing the options for how to improve performance at its struggling North America business, Financial Times' Laura Noonan and Stephen Morris reported, citing two people familiar with the matter. Senior management aim to present the plan to the bank's board in the coming weeks, the people said. 3. Critics have been raving about Apple's (AAPL) MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and Mac mini, which are all powered by Apple's new M1 chip, Alex Eule wrote in this week's edition of Barron's. The reviews featured benchmarking scores that showed the base-level MacBook outperforming some of the most expensive Macs, which still use chips from Intel (INTC), the author added. Apple consumers are happy again and investors shouldn't tune out Mac developments, Eule contended. 4. The chances that Jack Ma's Ant Group will be able to revive its massive stock listing next year are looking increasingly slim as China overhauls rules governing the fintech industry, according to Bloomberg, citing regulatory officials familiar with the matter. Ant is still in the early stages of reviewing changes needed to appease regulators, who demand that its business comply with a slate of new and proposed guidelines in areas including lending to consumers, the officials said. With so much work needed and some rules not yet spelled out, the officials said the initial public offering may not get done before 2022. Alibaba (BABA) owns a third of Ant. 5. Azek (AZEK), Ford (F) and Regis (RGS) saw positive mentions in this week's edition of Barron's.