United States

Now that the Fed has commenced its rate hike cycle, the jobs report suddenly takes on far less significance because only a massively "outlier" print will have an impact on Fed thinking, thinking which so far appears undented despite a raging manufacturing recession across the US. This means that the December jobs could be the "most important ever" only in retrospect, with either a huge miss (think < 100,000) or huge beat (> 275,000) having a material impact at a time when algos are much more focused on China scrambling to prevent its economy - and market - crashing, hard.

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is an intelligent man who can get his views across in the simplest of manners, but it comes as at a price. He tweeted in less than 140 characters that the terror threat is high and warned people to get smart. People around the world have reviewed his latest tweet as a sign that the Republican hopeful might not be the right candidate for the U.S. presidency. Trump said on Thursday: “Man shot inside Paris police station. Just announced that terror threat is at highest level. Germany is a total mess-big crime.

When we previewed yesterday's Chinese trading session, which far more important to the US market than today's Nonfarm payrolls report (Exp. +200K, 4.9% Unemployment rate), we said to "keep an eye on the Yuan fixing around 8 pm: if the USDCNY sees another substantial jump (i.e., Yuan decline) from last night's 5 year low rate of 6.5646, this could suggest further turbulence and as all self-fulfilling prophecies go, unleash another pukefest which not even the circuit breaker adjustment will fix.

Over 20 million lives are at risk from violence, starvation and lack of medical care in Yemen due to the ongoing US orchestrated holocaust currently being conducted in the country.  A UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) report downplayed the ongoing catastrophe by undercounting civilian casualties since conflict began last March 2015. SteveLendmanBlog reports: The world community remains largely indifferent, ignoring an entire population at risk. Millions may perish before conflict ends. Nothing is being done to prevent it. Fighting shows no signs of abating.

Submitted by Arthur Berman via OilPrice.com,

Daniel Yergin and other experts say that U.S. tight oil is the swing oil producer of the world.

They are wrong. It is preposterous to say that the world’s largest oil importer is also its swing producer.

There are two types of oil producers in the world: those who have the will and the means to affect market prices, and those who react to them. In other words, the swing producer and everyone else.

A swing producer must meet the following criteria: