Europe

European MEPs are seeking to prosecute Eurosceptic French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen after she criticised ISIS on Twitter.  An EU parliamentary committee has voted to strip Le Pen of her diplomatic immunity in an attempt to throw her to the wolves and end her political career. Le Pen, leader of an anti-European party and favourite to win the French presidency, is under investigation for posting images that show Islamic State militants beheading American journalist James Foley in 2015.

So after the biggest inflows to SPY in 27 months sending stocks soaring on dropping volume and plunging GDP expectations, today saw Stocks Down, Bonds Down, Gold Down, VIX Down, USD Up, Rate Hike Odds Up...

But it was all so easy yesterday!

At exactly 1130ET (as Europe closed), someone decided to unload over $2 billion notional of silver into the futures pits...

Over 23,000 Silver futures contracts suddenly puked into the market as soon as Europe closed...

Silve rhad managed to get back most of the losses post-election but once the selling broke 18.155 (200DMA) it accelerated...this is the biggest drop since The Fed hiked rates in December.

Gold is also getting hit but far less aggressively...

Donald Trump may soon find himself on the receiving end of a "visa war" that could have dire consequences for trans-Atlantic travel and European tourism. On Thuesday, EU lawmakers voted to force Americans to apply for visas when traveling to Europe in response to Washington refusing to allow all Europeans to travel to the States visa-free.

Can Truth Prevail?

Paul Craig Roberts

According to official US economic data, the US Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has expanded for 22 quarters, raising real GDP 12.1% above its high prior to the 2008-09 economic contraction. Yet, US manufacturing output and US industrial production have not recovered to their pre-contraction high.

So what is driving the real GDP growth? In my opinion, the rise in real GDP is an illusion produced by the under-measurement of inflation.