With much of Europe and Asia, including the U.K., France, Germany and China markets closed for Labor Day, Asian stocks and the dollar rose buoyed by news that Congress had reached a deal to keep the US government funded through the end of September. S&P futures are up 4 points or 0.2%. Oil declined as rigs targeting crude in the U.S. rose for a fifteenth week and output from Libya rebounded.
After a mangled deployment of Trump's aircraft carrier "armada" during which miscommunication between the White House and the Pentagon meant the USS Carl Vinson would arrive off the North Korea coast weeks after what Trump had initially suggested, on Saturday Japan's public broadcaster NHK aired footage of the U.S. aircraft carrier sailing off the coast of Nagasaki prefecture in southern Japan, hours after the latest failed ballistic missile test by North Korea..
While Hawaiian officials are pushing to re-open fallout shelters, the people of another island (considerably closer, and well within range) are actively preparing for a worst case scenario from North Korea. As Reuters reports, sales of nuclear shelters and radiation-blocking air purifiers have surged in Japan in recent weeks as North Korea has pressed ahead with missile tests in defiance of U.N. sanctions.
Japan is well within range of already-tested North Korean missiles...
And that has prompted aoring demand among the Japanese people...
It all started in February, when we first reported that something unexpected had happened: for reasons that were at the time unknown, the global credit impulse had unexpectedly tumbled, turning negative, a move which we predicted would result in a steep slide in the "soft" economic data, end the "reflation" optimism and unleash a wave of dovishness from the Fed.
European stocks slide as traders returned from a 4-day Easter holidays, Asian equities likewise drop pressured by the ongoing rout in iron ore, while U.S. stock-index futures point to a lower open. British markets were roiled after U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May said she would seek an early election on June 8, in a move aimed at strengthening her hand going into Brexit talks; the FTSE 100 dropped 1.3%, on the news, hitting the lowest since Feb. 24 while 10Y Gilts dropped below 1% for the first time since October.