Repeating what Russian diplomats said informally at the start of the week, the Russian foreign ministry said on Friday that "too many American spies operated in Moscow" under diplomatic cover and warned it might expel some of them to retaliate against Washington's December 2016 expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats.
The dollar was broadly weaker after dovish comments from Fed Governor Lael Brainard amid reverberations from reports of Donald Trump Jr.’s contact with a Russian lawyer; European equities rebounded with oil while S&P futures were 0.2% higher at 2,428; Treasury yields are 1-2bps lower across the curve with the 10y at 2.346% ahead of Yellen’s much anticipated testimony this morning (House today, Senate tomorrow) for further clues on the trajectory of monetary policy while the Bank of Canada is expected to hike rates later.
Over the past several years we have repeatedly stated that despite protests to the contrary, the single biggest factor explaining the underperformance of the active community in general, and hedge funds in particular, has been the ubiquitous influence of the Fed and other central banks over the capital markets, coupled with the prevasive presence of quantitative strategies, HFTs, algo trading and more recently, a surge in price-indescriminate purchases by passive, ETF managers.
Putin’s Assessment of Trump at the G-20 Will Determine Our Future
Paul Craig Roberts
The backdrops to the Putin/Trump meeting are the aspirations of Israel and the neoconservatives. It is these aspirations that drive US foreign policy.
Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,
The 4th of July is upon us.
We will hear all sorts of patriotic BS about how wonderful we are and how thankful we are to our brave military which defends our liberty.
Not a word will be said about the destruction by the Bush and Obama regimes of the US Constitution, which once protected our liberty far better than any military action.