Authored by Peter Korzun via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
The Islamic State (IS) fighters are trying to flee Mosul. No doubt, the US-supported Iraqi forces will establish control over the city pretty soon. At first, IS militants will leave Iraq for the province of Deir-ez-Zor, Syria, to intensify fighting there. But with Syria no longer a safe haven, they’ll have to move elsewhere looking for weak points, like the countries of Maghreb.
In early March, Goldman's John Marshall looked at the firm's proprietary macro hedging indicator and found something peculiar: investors were buying stocks and discarding protection. As Marshall said at the time, this was a reflection of "How Trump Changed the Market", and said added that "the cost of liquid long-dated hedges in equity and credit has collectively reached its lowest level in six years following the decline this week. The last time macro hedge costs were near this level across assets was in July 2015."
Authored by Jeff Thomas via InternationalMan.com,
It’s not a story that’s likely to appear on the evening news, but it certainly should.
Deutsche Bank has announced that it will create more shares, selling them at a 35% discount. Existing shareholders have not been pleased and, in the first four days since the offer was announced, the value of existing shares dropped by 13% as shareholders began dumping them.
Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,
To paraphrase that great scene from Airplane, it looks like I picked the wrong week to unplug from the Internet. Aside from a few hours when we docked in Honduras last week, I was on a self-imposed Internet exile and went several days devoid of any communication with the outside world. I missed a major scandal at the Fed, another terror attack in Europe, the start of a US military campaign in Syria, political chaos in South Africa, and more.
With Morgan Stanley's Adam Parker having left the investment bank to continue his career at Eminence Capital, it was up to his replacement, Michael Wilson to come up with the Initiation of coverage report for the "Classic Late Cycle." So, in keeping a stiff upper lip, and breaking away from the gloom that appears to have recently gripped his colleagues over at Goldman Sachs, Wilson had no choice but to keep a stiff upper lip and keep the Punch Bowl full (to paraphrase Bill Dudley's famous March 30 speech).