presidential election

Trust between Russia and the US has collapsed under the Trump administration, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated on Wednesday, as Moscow delivered an unusually frigid if not hostile reception to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in a face-off over Syria, shortly after Putin said the recent chemical attack was a staged "false flag" and predicted that more are coming, while at the same time the US accused Russia of a gas attack "cover up."

S&P futures are unchanged and Asian stocks closed mixed, however European stocks rebounded for first time this week, led by auto stocks after Daimler’s quarterly profit, as a break in alarming political news prompted traders to "swoop" - as Reuters puts it - on equities, cooling a safe-haven rally that saw the yen and gold at five-month highs and global government bond yields to drop their lowest this year.

Authored by Antonius Aquinas,

The Cost Of A Trump Presidency

Last Thursday’s wanton attack on a Syrian air field by the US and its bellicose actions toward North Korea have brought to the forefront the real cost of candidate Trump’s landslide victory last November.

Via Disobedient Media

With the rise of communist candidate Melenchon throwing the French election results into disarray for the status quo supporters, it appears traders are rushing headlong for the safety of core-core Europe and rapidly exiting anything to do with France.

As reported in our overnight wrap, the recent surge in far-left candidate Melenchon has changed the French presidential election calculus materially in recent days, sending the spread between French and German 10Y blowing out again, helped by yesterday's Goldman downgrade of French OATs.