Submitted by Jeffrey Snider via Alhambra Investment Partners,
Amidst all the pearls of wisdom unleashed in mainstream economics over the past unbelievable eight years or so, it was one paragraph of common sense that had it been written and appreciated at the start of this period might have saved us all the inordinate and totally unwarranted trouble.
In a review published on Monday, the UK's Financial Conduct Authority said that treating clients to a round of golf, or attending social events such as tennis matches or concerts, doesn't enhance the quality of service to clients, and meetings could take place without such activities.
The wording at the bottom of the key findings says the following:
"Your firm should consider these findings and expectations and ensure they meet the current requirements."
China's shift to an official local-currency-based gold fixing is "the culmination of a two-year plan to move away from a US-centric monetary system," according to Bocom strategist Hao Hong.
Despite a denial by the Russians, and now an outright statement that Russia "doubts any freeze deal is possible in the foreseeable future," crude prices are surging as momo algos jump on every headline!
As The FT reports,
The Fed's troubling, recurring and perhaps criminal data "leakage" problem has been thoroughly documented over the past years: from Tim Geithner telling bank CEOs what the Fed will do will in advance of it becoming before, to early leaks of Fed Minutes, to breached embargoes, to the release of material non-public information to consultants such as Medley (which the FBI has been supposedly probing for the past year, and which cost Pedra da Costa his WSJ job), to the Fed's cozy relationship with the WSJ's Hilsenrath over the years, by now everyone knows that when it comes to giving advance lo