Europe

Submitted by Jennifer Thomson via Gavekal Capital blog,

Flash PMI data for Europe’s manufacturing sector, at 54.9 for December, paints an ever more positive picture, having surpassed the most recent high reached in early 2014 to retake levels not seen since 2011. The problem? Hard data (i.e. industrial production, released yesterday) isn’t keeping pace with the increasingly optimistic survey data.

Authored by Carl Bildt, originally posted at Project Syndicate,

In August 2015, I tweeted that if Donald Trump were to be elected President of the United States, we would have to “head for the bunkers.”

A Trump presidency was considered highly unlikely back then; but here we are. And while heading for the bunkers might not be the most appropriate response (yet), where we are is undoubtedly a more dangerous world.

The Great Rotation continued for one more week today with global equity funds receiving $21 billion in inflows in the past week according to Bank of America, the ninth-biggest inflow ever, as investors rushed into 'Trump trade', while money flowed out of bonds for seventh week in a row. The EPFR-based report showed overall equity inflows of $63 billion since Donald Trump's U.S. presidential election win on Nov. 8, offsetting somewhat the $151 billion in outflows observed from January to October.

Quad-witching Friday has arrived, which means that alongside thin, pre-holiday liquidity and a jumpy market, we expect to see sharp, volatile moves for the rest of the day, the first of which was just noted in Europe, where stocks moved from session lows to highs in the span of minutes, in the process sending the Euro Stoxx 50 index 0.8% higher and turning it positive on the year as it reached its highest level since December 2015. The broader Stoxx 600 remains still down 1.8% on the year.