The New Year begins with companies already putting into action the supply chain strategies they applied during the upheaval of the Covid-19 pandemic. Global supply chains are entering 2024 roiled by urgent disruption at the Suez Canal and longer-term concerns at the Panama Canal. The WSJ Logistics Report’s Paul Berger writes that the struggles at the crucial shipping corridors come as geopolitical tensions are redrawing trade maps. Sudden shocks alongside growing trade restrictions and new supply chains behind developing technologies are putting a premium on flexibility and resilience. Those were the key principles many supply-chain managers said they took from the pandemic upheaval, when shipping disruptions, product shortages and abrupt changes in consumer buying patterns pushed shippers and carriers alike to adjust seemingly on the fly. Companies are looking to apply more discipline to their operations in 2024 even as the world around them only seems to grow more unpredictable.

Today's first newsletter of 2024 includes a special Outlook section with in-depth stories from across our professional team on what corporate leaders in finance, information technology, cybersecurity and others see arising in the coming year.

Global mergers and acquisitions activity is on track to fall 20% in 2023 compared with 2022, to a total value of about $3 trillion, according to advisory firm Bain & Co. CFO Journal's Kristin Broughton maps five charts that track M&A in 2023 and 2024.

CFO Journal's Mark Maurer looks at a series of initiatives that the Financial Accounting Standards Board aims to advance in 2024, including accounting for software costs and environmental credits and greater disclosure of income-statement expenses.

Corporate technology leaders remain focused on delivering innovation even as their budgets remain flat, Isabelle Bousquette writes for CIO Journal.

Companies wanted 2023 to bring certainty on sustainability disclosures and regulations. They didn’t get it. But as CFO Journal's Jennifer Williams-Alvarez and Mark Maurer write, many continue to hope for greater clarity around such regulations in 2024.

The cybersecurity threats, rising cyber regulation, tight talent markets and increased costs for cyber insurance that challenged companies in 2023 are only likely to intensify this year, WSJ Pro Cybersecurity's Kim Nash reports.

Lower battery metal prices have made electric vehicles and electrical grid storage cheaper, but persistently low prices could delay investment required to ramp up supply of energy-transition materials, making the shift to a green economy slower and more expensive, Yusuf Khan writes for WSJ Pro Sustainable Business.

The retailer rush to sell goods heading toward the end of 2023 is giving way to a 2024 returns hangover. A warehouse outside Allentown, Pa., operated by retail-services company Inmar Intelligence got busier closer to the holidays and is now essentially in its peak season, the period when product returns are dealt with. The WSJ Logistics Report’s Liz Young writes that the site, with its huge gray bins and unlikely array of varied merchandise, is part of a vast and largely unseen part of the retail economy, the reverse logistics operations that take over when sales go wrong. Mastercard SpendingPulse estimates holiday sales this season rose 3.1%. That caps a year when Americans were estimated to buy more than $5 trillion of goods. Yet shoppers in 2022 returned 16.5% of items they purchased, valued at nearly $817 billion and double the percentage of goods returned in 2019.

Furniture retailer Malouf sells beds and bedding in a fraction of the colors it did a few years ago. Newell Brands has retired 50 types of Yankee Candle and Coca-Cola offers half as many drinks. The slimmer choices at supermarkets and retail stores are part of the legacy of the Covid-19 pandemic, when companies pared their offerings to ease clogs in the supply chain. The WSJ Logistics Report’s Paul Berger writes that logistical messes in general have receded but many of the choices aren’t returning. That's helped make supply chains simpler, from production to distribution, in a world where broader uncertainties demand more attention. Executives at consumer-product companies say the slimmer product lines have also bolstered profitability amid higher interest rates and high labor and raw-material costs. By one estimate, large grocery stores have reduced fresh-food offerings such as dairy products and deli meats by 15% to 20%.

China’s official manufacturing surveys suggest factory activity slid deeper into contraction in December. (WSJ)

Maersk suspended Red Sea transports after a U.S. Navy vessel destroyed three boats carrying pro-Iranian Yemeni rebels following an attack on a Maersk-owned containership. (WSJ)

Apple won approval to restart most sales of imported watches that a federal agency had barred. (WSJ)

California regulators extended to Jan. 31 the deadline for reporting on clean truck rules. (Commercial Carrier Journal)

Russia says it reached a new record for cargo moved on the Northern Sea Route in 2023. (Maritime Executive)

DoorDash wants to use its financial clout to diversify beyond its core business of delivering restaurant meals to home diners. (Financial Times)

A fire broke out on a ship off the Alaska coast carrying lithium-ion batteries. (New York Times)

Paul Page is editor of WSJ Logistics Report. Reach him at paul.page@wsj.com.

Follow the WSJ Logistics Report team: @PaulPage, @bylizyoung and @pdberger. Follow the WSJ Logistics Report on X at @WSJLogistics.