Europe

Disappointing inflation and retail sales data has sparked a surge in safe-haven demand for bonds and bullion, and left stocks confused this morning ahead of The Fed statement and press conference this afternoon...

A disastrous morning for US macro data - and yet we are assured by The Fed that a hike is overdue and everything is awesome...

It's not!

Gold and Bonds are well bid...

Pushing 10Y yield to its lowest since Nov 10th...

And Nasdaq jumped on the dovish-inspiring data dump...

With last Friday's "tech wreck" now a distant memory, this morning the "FOMC Drift" described yesterday, which "guarantees" higher stock prices and a lower dollar heading into the Fed announcement is in full effect, with European and Asian stocks rising for a second day, led by rebounding tech shares, while S&P futures are modestly in the green and stocks on Wall Streets hit a record high overnight.

Authored by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

In a climate of outright confrontation, even the Gulf monarchies have been overtaken by a series of unprecedented events. The differences between Qatar on one side, and Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain on the other, have escalated into a full-blown diplomatic crisis with outcomes difficult to foresee.

In his last interview as part of the Barron's Roundtable, from which he is retiring at the end of the year after three decades of participation, Felix Zulauf, owner of Zug-based Zulauf Asset Management had some parting words of caution.

As the Fed begins its two-day meeting, global stocks have recovered their footing and European shares rise, led by a bounce in tech stocks as last Friday's global selloff that started in the sector shows signs of abating. Asian stocks and U.S. futures gain as investors turn their attention to today's Jeff Sessions testimony as well as tomorrow's barrage of macro data including Yellen, CPI and retail sales.