Business

When most Americans think about agriculture, they picture a small mom and pop farm with a few hundred acres and a small group of happy cows. Few realize that small agricultural enterprises are far from the norm today: as Leah Douglas wrote for Pacific Standard yesterday, “just four companies control 65 percent of pork slaughter, 84 percent of cattle slaughter, and 53 percent of chicken slaughter. Milk production is largely shaped by one large processor, Dean Foods, and one large cooperative, Dairy Farmers of America.” What are the practical results of this?

Following last week's Sohn Conference, where the overarching theme was one of prevailing bearishness topped by Stanley Druckenmiller's near-apocalyptic forecast that only gold will be left standing after all confidence evaporates in the "magic people" known as central bankers,  yesterday some 1,800 hedge fund industry executives gathered in Las Vegas at the SkyBridge Alternatives Conference or SALT, where the prevalent concern about the future of the world continued, driven primarily by worries about China.

Since the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) released what is referred to as the "Panama Papers", there has been a flurry of activity taking place to see just who was involved, and to what extent.

Earlier this week, the ICIJ released a searchable database containing nearly 214,000 offshore entities created in 21 jurisdictions to make it easier for those who wish to continue to dig through the data.

• Brazil's Rousseff undone by hubris, economic missteps (Reuters)
• Trump’s Early Backers on Capitol Hill See Their Profile Raised (WSJ)
• Oil prices rise toward six-month high, tightening supply (Reuters)
• EIA says outlook for oil brightens as output disruptions erode surplus (Reuters)
• Investors Fleeing $9 Trillion of Negative Yields Fuel Bond Binge (BBG)
• Beaten-Up Hedge Fund Billionaires Reminisce About 'Golden Age' (BBG)
• Hong Kong first-quarter economic growth likely weakest in 4 years (Reuters)

If yesterday's selloff had a specific catalyst, namely some of the worst consumer retail earnings seen in years, it merely undid the Tuesday rally which levitated global risk with no fundamental driver, aside for a 200 pip spike in the USDJPY.  Some central bankers may even say it was a "magical" levitation.