France

Via MauldinEconomics.com,

What does it mean to be French? Inherent in this question is a fundamental tension within French nationalism that is unique to France.

Originally, France consisted of diverse regions with their own languages, resources, and way of life. Take a look at the map below.

This diversity grew into a united country. From this, we can understand how one aspect of French nationalism is that it views itself as a universal program.

Nearly half of all French voters have yet to decide who they want to be president with only a month to go until the election, an opinion poll showed on Friday, as scandal-hit conservative candidate Francois Fillon launched an extraordinary attack on Socialist President Francois Hollande, accusing him of orchestrating a plot against him. The big question therefore remains - Is a “European Spring” in the making?

With just one month to go until the French presidential election, President Vladimir Putin met the leader of the National Front, Marine Le Pen, in the Kremlin on Friday, and as Reuters summarized, "handed her a potential boost to her campaign to win next month's presidential election in France."

 Putin told Le Pen Moscow reserved the right to meet any French politician it wanted and that she represented "quite a fast-growing element of European political forces."

Asian shares and S&P futures rose on optimism that today's rescheduled U.S. vote on health care will pass following Trump's Ultimatum to the Freedom Caucus. European stocks gave up some of Thursday’s gains, falling for the fourth time in five days, and moving further away from a 15-month high reached a week ago while the yen weakened for the first time in nine days before the long awaited U.S. health-care vote that has dominated market sentiment this week. Oil was headed for a third weekly drop this month. Economic data include durable goods orders, Markit U.S. manufacturing PMI.

European and Asian stocks were modestly in the green, with U.S. futures higher, before a critical procedural vote on a Republican health-care bill to repeal Obamacare, while Janet Yellen is set to speak in Washington at 8:45am.