Asia

It's 2018 forecast time for the big banks. With Goldman unveiling its seven Top Trades for 2018 earlier, overnight it was also UBS' turn to reveal its price targets for the S&P in the coming year, and not surprisingly, the largest Swiss bank was extremely bullish, so much so in fact that its base case is roughly where Goldman expects the S&P to be some time in the 2020s (at least until David Kostin revises his price forecast shortly).

After five consecutive daily losses on the MSCI world stock index and seven straight falls in Europe, there was finally a bounce, as investors returned to global equity markets in an optimistic mood on Thursday, sending US futures higher after several days of losses as global stocks rebounded following a Chinese commodity-driven rout. 

Two days ago, President Trump tweeted that he would make a "major statement" upon his return from Asia. That time has come. Today at 3:30pmET, President Trump will let us all know... Is it war with North Korea? Rejoining TPP? Denouncing Roy Moore?  Declaring victory over tax reform and healthcare repeal? Celebrating his relationship with China? Banning NYT and CNN? Admitting he really did collude with Putin?

The euphoria of the past month has ended with a thud and BTFDers are strangely missing as the commodity chill out of China (which overnight became full blown carnage), has unleashed a global risk-off phase ahead of today's critical CPI data, resulting in broad and sharp selling across global markets, as European stocks followed declines in Asia while bonds and gold advanced. The equity retreat, which spread to U.S. stock futures, started with last night's sharp puke in Chinese commodities.

Authored by James Rickards via The Daily Reckoning,

President Trump is wrapping up his historic visit to Asia today. Trump’s journey is the longest overseas trip of his presidency and the longest Asian visit of any president in 25 years.

After a stopover in Hawaii, Trump proceeded to Japan, where he met with Japanese Prime Minister Shinz? Abe, and then to South Korea where he met with President Moon Jae-in.