Europe

In a world where fundamentals don't matter, everyone's attention will be on Janet Yellen who speaks at 1:15pm today in Harvard, hoping to glean some more hints about the Fed's intentionas and next steps, including a possible rate hike in June or July. And with a long holiday in both the US and UK (US bond market closes at 2pm today), it is no surprise overnight trading volumes have been dreadful, helping keep global equities poised for the highest close in three weeks; this won't change unless Yellen says something that would disrupt the calm that’s settled over financial markets.

Submitted by Giulio Meotti via The Gatestone Institute,

• In 2006, Pope Benedict XVI said what no Pope had ever dared to say -- that there is a link between violence and Islam. Ten years later, Pope Francis never calls those responsible for anti-Christian violence by name and never mentions the word "Islam."

“Something startling is happening to middle-aged white Americans. Unlike every other age group, unlike every other racial and ethnic group … death rates in this group have been rising, not falling.”

The big new killers of middle-aged white folks? Alcoholic liver disease, overdoses of heroin and opioids, and suicides. So wrote Gina Kolata in the New York Times of a stunning study by the husband-wife team of Nobel laureate Angus Deaton and Anne Case.

Authored by Pepe Escobar, Op-Ed via RT.com,

So foreign ministers from the 28 NATO member-nations met in Brussels for a two-day summit, while mighty military power Montenegro was inducted as a new member.

Global Robocop NATO predictably discussed Afghanistan (a war NATO ignominiously lost); Iraq (a war the Pentagon ignominiously lost); Libya (a nation NATO turned into a failed state devastated by militia hell); Syria (a nation NATO, via Turkey, would love to invade, and is already a militia hell).

For many weeks in a row now we have been asking, mostly jokingly, how with everyone else (both retail and "smart money") selling, and with stock buybacks sharply lower in recent months, is the market higher. Specifically, who is buying?

This question is no longer a joke. After this week's 17th consecutive outflow by "smart money" funds (mostly on the back of surging hedge fund redemption), moments ago we got the latest Lipper fund flow data. It was, as BofA put it, "unambiguous risk-off weekly flows."