Submitted by Paul-Martin Foss via The Mises Institute,
With a new year come new opportunities as well as new issues to take into consideration. Here are the five most important issues to keep an eye on in 2017.
1. Trump Presidency
Global stocks were fractionally lower in early European trading, closed Asia mixed, while S&P futures were unchanged, as the dollar fell for a second day on concerns ahead of Trump's press conference on Wednesday. Oil rebounded after its Monday plunge, while commodity metals like iron ore rose limit up in Chinese trading. Top overnight stories include Valeant announcing the sale of $2.1 billion in assets to pay down debt; VW managers warned to stay in Germany as U.S. charges near; Yahoo! plans to shrink board, get rid of Marissa Meyer and change its name after Verizon deal.
Submitted by Soeren Kern via The Gatestone Institute,
In what may have been this weekend's biggest surprise, and one which some have suggested demonstrated Beppe Grillo's true nature, in a blog published on Sunday, the founder of Italy's Five-Star Movement (M5S) said his political movement should ditch Nigel Farage's anti-EU UK Independence Party (UKIP) in the European Parliament, and seek a hook up with the liberal pro-EU group Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, or ALDE, led by European Federalist Guy Verhofstadt, in an attempt to consolidated power in the European parliament.
In 1945, most French people thought that the Soviet Union deserved the most credit for Nazi Germany's defeat in World War II - even though the Soviets did not play much of a role in France's liberation, relative to the US and Britain.
By 1995 and 2004, however, the French had changed their minds, and were crediting the US as the biggest contributor to victory in Europe (survey data from the French Institute of Public Opinion)...
Source: Olivier Berruyer at Les Crises blog