United States

With the US closed for Memorial Day and UK markets offline due to a bank holiday, overnight volumes have been weaker than normal on little newsflow. The main story remains the stronger USD following Yellen's hawkish Friday speech, which not only led to the lowest Yuan fixing since February 2011...

... but pushed the USDJPY almost as high as 111.50 overnight before paring gains, however it was enough to send the Nikkei 1.4% higher.

John Hudson reports that the Obama administration is finally blocking the transfer of cluster munitions to Saudi Arabia:

Submitted by Erico Matias Tavares via Sinclair & Co.,

Americans will be celebrating Memorial Day this weekend, to honor those who fought and died for the values they have traditionally cherished the most as a nation: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

New legislation is being introduced in the US House of Representatives which, if passed, will create a real life “Ministry of Truth” as depicted in George Orwell’s 1984 novel.  The H.R. 5181 bill aims to create a department responsible for creating U.S. propaganda in order to counter efforts by Russia and China’s spread of disinformation. H.R. 5181, or the Countering Information Warfare Act of 2016, is sponsored by Representative Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) who co-authored the bill with Congressman Ted Lieu (D-CA).

This is grim: