China

Submitted by Gordon Johnson of Axiom Capital Research

Last night, China published May, 2017 new home pricing data for its 70 city index, which showed a continued slowing in growth (a key driver for commodity consumption inside China). More specifically, in May, new home prices across the China 70 city index advanced just 0.74% m/m, while annual growth, or the most important metric here, fell further to just +9.46% y/y (vs. +9.63% annual growth in April, and +10.51% annual growth December, 2016).

S&P futures rose 0.3% in subdued trading with Dow Jones futs once again in record territory as European stocks jump 0.6% following Sunday's landslide victory for Macron's party in the French parliamentary elections and as Brexit negotiations are set to officially roll out on Monday.

Two weeks ago, a key China-linked concern that made headlines back in 2013 and 2014 reemerged after an extensive analysis by Reuters reporter Engen Tham found that China's "ghost collateral" problem, or collateral that was either rehypothecated between two or more loans, or simply did not exist, had not only not gone away but was still as prevalent as ever if not worse.

Last summer, when the Syrian conflict was near its peak under the Obama administration, China unexpectedly warned it was ready to enter the proxy war when in a stunning announcement, Xinhua reported that Beijing was prepared to side with Syria and Russia, against the US-led alliance, and that Xi and Assad had agreed that the Chinese military will have closer ties with Syria and provide humanitarian aid to the civil war torn nation.

Authored by Daniel Greenfield via FrontPageMag.com,

After President Trump rejected the Paris Climate treaty, which had never been ratified by the Senate, the European Union announced that it would work with a climate confederacy of secessionist US states.