European Union

While traders eagerly await Theresa May's speech set to begin in minutes, even if it was largely leaked last night to minimize "market shocks" and set the stage for a big squeeze in cable which at last check was over 100 pips higher overnight, the big catalyst setting today's risk off mood was the previously noted Trump statement, published overnight by the WSJ, in which Trump called the US currency "too strong", and attacked the Border-Tax Adjustment, expected to boost the value of the USD by as much as 15% should it be implemented.

While hardly coming as much of a a surprise following the weekend's news that Theresa May would call for a "clean and hard Brexit", confirmation received moments ago from both the Telegraph, FT and Bloomberg that on Tuesday May will indeed declare that Britain is making a "clean break" from the EU and will not seek a deal that leaves the country “half in and half out”, has send the sterling lower by some 25 pips, because even though the news is not incremental, as Bloomberg notes quoting a trader, "Algos Trade Off Keyword Flagged in Speech."

Authored by Oaktree Capital's Howard Marks,

In August, I mentioned that I had chosen the title “Political Reality” for my memo in part because of my liking for oxymorons.  I classed that title with other internally contradictory statements, such as “jumbo shrimp” and “common sense.”  Now I’m going to discuss one more: “expert opinion.”

In two separate, and quite striking, interviews with Germany's Bild (paywall) and London's Sunday Times (paywall), Donald Trump did what he failed to do in his first US press conference, and covered an extensive amount of policy and strategy, much of which however will likely please neither the pundits, nor the markets.

While the track record of the Sunday Times over the past 24 hours is somewhat spotty, following a report that as his foreign trip abroad once officially president, Trump is planning a summit with Putin in Reykjavik, which in turn was promptly denied by Trump staffers who called the story "fantasy", overnight the paper also reported that UK Prime Minister Theresa May will announce that Britain is "seeking a clean and hard Brexit" in a speech this week that will promise to create a “strong new partnership” with the European Union.