US equity futures are lower, as are European and Asian markets, with sentiment after the latest batch of earnings after yesterday’s close were mostly mixed or negative (particularly Fedex and Nike, both of which guided lower again). S&P500 futs are down 0.2%, off session lows, with the index facing an additional test on Friday in the form of a huge option expiration quad-witching. Nasdaq futures dropped 0.3% with all Lag 7 names lower led by NVDA -1.2%, and TSLA -0.7%. Micron reversed an earlier gain after reporting earnings after hours and was down 3%-premarket amid margin weakness. 10Y Treasury yields are down 4bps while the dollar reversed an earlier gain. In commodities, oil markets are already feeling the effect of the first effort to target a vast private processing industry, with traders preparing for significant disruption after Washington’s move to sanction a Chinese refiner over its Iranian links. London’s Heathrow airport will be closed all day Friday and service interruptions are likely to continue for days after a nearby fire cut power to the hub and brought travel to a standstill. Today, the macro data calendar is largely quiet, with eyes on any additional headlines from the White House.

In premarket trading, TSLA stock was down even as Elon Musk sought to reassure Tesla employees that despite “rocky moments,” they should “hang onto” their stock. Other Mag 7 names were also mostly lower (Alphabet -0.2%, Amazon -0.2%, Apple -0.7%, Microsoft -0.2%, Meta +0.2%, Nvidia -0.7% and Tesla -0.1%). Nike tumbled 6% as the company signaled further declines in revenue and profitability due to an ongoing merchandise reset and the impact of US tariffs on products from China and Mexico. FedEx was just as ugly, sliding 7% after the parcel delivery company lowered its full-year guidance for a third consecutive quarter, citing inflation and uncertain demand for shipments. Here are some other notable premarket movers:

• Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ALNY) gains 5% after the company won expanded approval for a heart drug that could be the biggest boon yet for the 23-year-old biotech and put it in competition with Pfizer Inc.
• Lennar Corp. (LEN) declines 4% after the homebuilder’s margin guidance came in below expectations amid a challenging US housing market.
• Lockheed Martin (LMT) inches 2% higher after Bloomberg reported the White House is poised to announce on Friday the winner of its contest to build the next-generation fighter jet, choosing between the aerospace giant and peer Boeing.
• Luminar (LAZR) climbs 8% after the automotive technology company reported revenue for the fourth quarter that beat the average analyst estimate.
• Nio Inc. (NIO) ADRs slip 4% after the Chinese electric vehicle maker now expects to deliver only as many as 43,000 cars in the three months that will end March 31; that’s short of the around 65,000 units the market was looking for.
• Ouster Inc. (OUST) rises 5% after the maker of sensors used in robotics posted 4Q revenue that increased 23% from the year-ago period and beat estimates.
• Planet Labs (PL) slides 9% after the Earth imaging company’s revenue outlook disappointed.

The S&P 500 is up slightly this week, following four weeks of losses. As previewed yesterday, stocks face a big test today in the form of another massive quad-witching , an event that can stoke volatility as options contracts worth $4.7 trillion head for expiry, including $2.8 trillion of S&P index and $645 billion of single stock options. Goldman doesn’t see the gamma picture getting meaningfully better as we continue to be well below most call overwriting strikes. Interesting to note that since the close on March 10, S&P is up 48pts, but VIX spot is down more than 8pts. This demonstrates the vol destruction the past week, even as the market itself has not recovered much. Further, we have seen fixed strike vol compression every day this week as vol supply has not let up for even 1 day

Not helping matters was the latest batch of dour earnings from FDX and NKE which added to concerns over a worsening global economic outlook, especially ahead of Trump’s April 2 deadline for a series of broad reciprocal tariffs. While the Federal Reserve has indicated it sees room to cut interest rates, many economists fear the inflationary impact of tariffs will hinder central banks from delivering support to slowing economies. 

“The Fed revised their growth forecast lower earlier this week, so the whole street is moving their forecast lower. But they could have further to go,” said Michael Metcalfe, head of macro strategy at State Street Global Markets. “We just need to see whether what we’ve seen so far this year is the start of something more serious in terms of slow growth.”

Despite the challenges, investors haven’t entirely given up on equities with US stock funds enjoying the largest weekly inflows this year on a view that the trade war won’t derail the economy or equity market, BofA’s Michael Hartnett said.

Meanwhile, the Turkish lira headed for its biggest weekly crash in nearly two years, shrugging off an emergency rate increase in the face of mounting political tensions. Istanbul stocks were halted again, after plunging as much as 7%, having shed $30 billion in value this week.

European stocks decline, with the Stoxx 600 down 0.7%. Regional airline stocks underperform after London’s Heathrow airport was shuttered by a major fire nearby.  Here are some of the biggest movers on Friday:

• Asos shares jump as much as 25%, their best day in nearly five years, after the online fashion retailer reiterated it expects a “significant improvement” in profitability in the first half.
• Energean shares rise as much as 5.8% after the oil and gas company said it has terminated a deal to sell natural gas assets to a unit of Carlyle Group.
• Tele2 shares gain as much as 3.4%, the most since January, after the Swedish telecommunications firm was upgraded to overweight from neutral at JPMorgan.
• IAG shares fall as much as 4.3% after British Airways hub Heathrow Airport was forced to close all day Friday after a nearby fire caused a power outage.
• Douglas shares fall as much as 23.5%, the most ever and to a record low, after the German beauty product retailer issued a profit warning.
• Wetherspoon shares slide as much as 12%, hitting a two-year low, after Shore Capital said it expects consensus estimates to fall after the pub chain’s results came in softer than anticipated in the first half.
• Amadeus Fire shares plunge as much as 13% after the German recruiter said it expects a significant fall in profit this year as the economic environment continues to deteriorate
• Ceres Power shares fall as much as 13% after the British fuel-cell technology company reported revenue that came in short of expectations and a guidance for 2025 that suggests no major commercial developments near term, according to RBC
• Polish Banks fall after Poland’s EU Funds Minister Katarzyna Pelczynska-Nalecz, member of junior coalition party, floated the idea of windfall tax for banks amid the industry’s record profit

Earlier in the session, Asian stocks fell as a selloff in Chinese shares extended amid a lack of catalysts, while traders braced for US President Donald Trump’s upcoming tariffs. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index declined as much as 0.7%, with Alibaba and TSMC among the biggest drags. Benchmarks in Taiwan, mainland China and Hong Kong declined, while South Korea gained. MSCI’s regional gauge is still headed for a nearly 2% advance this week. Chinese shares in Hong Kong posted their biggest two-day drop since October as traders digested earnings and awaited further policy catalysts.
“With the ‘Two Sessions’ now behind us, market attention has shifted to looming tariff risks set to take effect in less than two weeks, which may prompt investors to adjust their positioning amid the uncertainty,” said Jun Rong Yeap, market strategist at IG Asia. 

In FX, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.2% but was off session highs. The yen reversed a 0.3% drop against the greenback and was now higher. The pound and the euro lose 0.2% each. Spot gold drops $13 to around $3,032/oz. 

In rates, treasuries inch higher, pushing US 10-year yields down about 2 bps to 4.22%. Euro-area government bonds also advance with traders now pricing in two more quarter-point European Central Bank reductions this year.  Gilts fall, underperforming peers across the curve, after UK government borrowing topped estimates in February. UK 10-year yields rise 4 bps to 4.69%.

In commodities, European natural gas futures rise over 2% after an attack on a pumping station in Russia’s Kursk region. Oil prices dip, with WTI down 0.4% near $67.81 a barrel. Gold held near record highs, as several banks raised their price forecasts for the haven asset. Gold funds have seen the biggest four-week inflow ever, the BofA data showed. 

Looking to the day ahead, data releases include the UK GfK consumer confidence for March whilst in France there’s the manufacturing confidence for March and retail sales for February. Additionally, Eurozone consumer confidence for March and Italy’s current account balance for January will also be published. Outside of the Eurozone, we have Canada retail sales for January. Otherwise from central banks, we’ll hear from the Fed’s Williams and the ECB’s Escriva.

Market Snapshot

• S&P 500 futures down 0.4% to 5,638.25
• STOXX Europe 600 down 0.9% to 548.14
• MXAP down 0.5% to 188.95
• MXAPJ down 0.8% to 588.93
• Nikkei down 0.2% to 37,677.06
• Topix up 0.3% to 2,804.16
• Hang Seng Index down 2.2% to 23,689.72
• Shanghai Composite down 1.3% to 3,364.83
• Sensex up 0.6% to 76,786.38
• Australia S&P/ASX 200 up 0.2% to 7,931.23
• Kospi up 0.2% to 2,643.13
• German 10Y yield little changed at 2.76%
• Euro down 0.2% to $1.0825
• Brent Futures up 0.2% to $72.14/bbl
• Gold spot down 0.4% to $3,031.74
• US Dollar Index up 0.21% to 104.07

Top Overnight News

• Britain’s Heathrow Airport was shut on Friday after a huge fire at a nearby substation knocked out its power, stranding passengers around the world and angering airlines who questioned how such crucial infrastructure could collapse
• Germany’s new era of big spending is pulling up borrowing costs across Europe, reigniting jitters around fiscal stability on the continent’s periphery.
• Trump posted “Egg prices are WAY DOWN from the Biden inspired prices if just a few weeks ago. “Groceries” and Gasoline are down, also. Now, if the Fed would do the right thing and lower interest rates, that would be great!!!”
• Trump posted “Unlawful Nationwide Injunctions by Radical Left Judges could very well lead to the destruction of our Country!… STOP NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS NOW, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE”.
• Trump and Defense Secretary Hegseth are to deliver remarks from the Oval Office today at 11:00EDT/15:00GMT, according to the White House.
• President Trump denied a report that the Pentagon was going to brief Elon Musk about the US military’s plan for any war with China.
• Elon Musk sought to reassure Tesla Inc. employees during what he referred to as “a little bit of stormy weather,” after the carmaker’s shares plunged more than 50% in just three months.
• White House has commenced a review of Federal Agency plans for a 2nd round of mass layoffs: RTRS
• The Israeli cabinet voted early on Friday to dismiss the head of the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service effective April 10, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said, after three days of protests against the move.
• Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves is set to overshoot her borrowing forecasts significantly for the current fiscal year, highlighting the fragile state of the UK’s public finances ahead of a key economic statement next week.
• Germany’s move to unlock hundreds of billions of euros in debt-financed defense and infrastructure spending passed its final legislative hurdle on Friday when lawmakers in the upper house of parliament in Berlin approved the measures.
• The financial industry is abandoning caution and chasing the rally in European stocks, hiking their targets and looking to the upside.
• President Xi Jinping’s government is set to welcome a US senator close to Donald Trump for talks in China, as the world’s largest economies try to move forward trade negotiations that have stalled at lower levels. 
• China’s imports of US cotton, cars and some energy products all plunged in the first two months of the year after President Donald Trump started imposing tariffs and Beijing retaliated. In a prelude to what could be widespread disruption to global trade, Chinese purchases of cotton fell almost 80% from a year earlier, according to Bloomberg analysis of data released Thursday. Imports of large-engined cars were down nearly 70%, while purchases of crude oil and liquefied natural gas dropped more than 40%.

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

APAC stocks ultimately traded mixed following the choppy performance stateside in the aftermath of the Super Thursday deluge of central bank announcements and ahead of quad witching. ASX 200 was just about kept afloat by notable outperformance in Consumer Staples as shares of Coles and Woolworths rallied after a report by the competition regulator which noted the supermarket retailers along with discount rival Aldi, were among the most profitable supermarket businesses in the world. Nikkei 225 initially traded higher on favourable currency moves but then reversed course after hitting resistance ahead of the 38,000 level and as the mostly firmer-than-expected Japanese inflation data supported the case for the BoJ to continue policy normalisation in the future. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp were pressured despite the lack of fresh catalysts and as earnings results trickled in, while trade uncertainty continued to cloud over risk sentiment and NYT recently reported that Elon Musk is set to get access to a top-secret US plan for a potential war with China although President Trump later refuted this.

Top Asian News

• Elon Musk was initially reported to get access to a top-secret US plan for a potential war with China, according to the New York Times. However, President Trump later refuted the report which he said was fake news.
• Japan’s Rengo says second round data shows avg. wage hike of 5.4% for Fiscal 2025 vs 5.46% in the first-round data.
• Meituan (3690 HK) FY24 (CNH) Net Income 35.8bln (exp. 37.8bln), Revenue 337.6bln (exp. 337bln); Q4: Adj. Net Income 9.85bln (exp. 9.91bln), Revenue 88.5bln (exp. 87.9bln).
• Nio Inc (NIO) Q4 (CNY): EPS -3.17 (exp. -2.4) Revenue 19.7bln (exp. 20.07bln); sees Q1 total revenue 12.367-12.859bln

Top European News

• London’s Heathrow Airport said it is experiencing a significant power outage due to a fire at an electrical substation supplying the airport and will be closed until 23:59 GMT today, while it stated significant disruption is expected over the coming days and passengers should not travel to the airport under any circumstances until it reopens.
• Denmark is reportedly open to joint European projects and funding if required, via FT citing sources
• UK says it is pausing the publication of Service Producer Price Index and Producer Price Index; planning to recommence publication in the summer and will keep users informed of progress; CPI unaffected.
• German Bundesrat has passed the debt reform bill and EUR 500bln fund, according to the vote tally cited by Reuters

FX

• USD is slightly firmer and trading within a 103.74-104.15 range in what has been a quiet session thus far – the US data docket remains light for the remainder of the. Focus however, will be on Fed speak from Williams, Waller and Goolsbee; the former will see the release of an accompanying text release and a Q&A thereafter. Elsewhere, US President Trump is to speak with Hegseth at 15:00GMT.
• EUR is a little lower and trades towards the bottom end of a 1.0820-35 range, continuing the losses seen this week. Aside from EZ Consumer Confidence, the docket remains light with no ECB speakers scheduled – though some focus will be on DBRS, who will review France’s credit rating today.
• USD/JPY has edged higher and reclaimed the 149.00 handle despite the cautiousness in the region and with the pair also unfazed by the mostly firmer-than-expected Japanese inflation data.
• GBP is on the backfoot vs. the USD in an extension of yesterday’s downside. Despite yesterday’s mildly hawkish skew to the BoE announcement in which external member Mann reverted back to the unchanged camp, the pound has fallen victim to the broadly firmer USD. This morning’s public sector net borrowing data showed a further deterioration in the nation’s finances.
• Antipodeans are both struggling for direction after recent losses and with price action contained amid a quiet calendar and the mixed risk sentiment.

Fixed Income

• USTs are slightly firmer, in-fitting with action in Bunds as the risk tone remains under pressure this morning. US specifics a little light thus far though the docket ahead is packed. Firstly, POTUS is due to give remarks from the Oval Office at 15:00GMT alongside his Defence Secretary. Given Hegseth’s inclusion the remarks may be focussed on Iran, with rhetoric from the Supreme Leader this morning punchy. As it stands, USTs are at the upper-end of a 111-00 to 111-09 band, with yields softer across the curve which itself is incrementally steeper.
• Bunds are firmer and at the top-end of a 128.15-128.58 band. Strength this morning comes from the downbeat risk tone which broadly speaking appears to be a continuation of the recent narrative of taking risk off the table into the April 2nd tariff announcement. German Bundesrat has passed the debt reform bill and EUR 500bln fund, as expected.
• Gilts gapped higher by a handful of ticks given the lead from EGBs but then succumbed to the morning’s borrowing data and slumped to a 91.73 trough. However, as the risk tone deteriorated, the benchmark lifted off worst and briefly got back to within reach of the 92.00 mark in a 91.73-92.12 band; though, ultimately, Gilts remain under notable pressure. PSNB showed a larger-than-expected borrowing figure alongside a downward revision to the prior which has taken borrowing for the 11-months of the current FY to the GBP 132bln mark, exceeding the GBP 127.5bln forecast by the OBR for the entire FY period.

Commodities

• Crude is incrementally lower, after spending the majority of the European morning around the unchanged mark; WTI’May now trades towards the lower end of a USD 67.80-68.65/bbl range. Energy-specific newsflow has been light today, whilst punchy rhetoric from Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei failed to lift prices.
• Natural gas prices have been boosted today after Kyiv Post reported “Putin’s forces shelled the Sudzha gas metering station in Russia’s Kursk region with artillery in order to blame Ukraine — the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces”. In response to this attack, Russia’s Kremlin said Ukrainian President Zelensky cannot be trusted.
• Precious metals are on the backfoot, with spot gold pulling back from best levels in overnight trade; into the European session, price action has been fairly contained and currently sits towards the mid-point of a USD 3,021.73-3,047.51/oz range.
• Base metals are entirely in the red given the downbeat risk tone and poor Chinese performance overnight. 3M LME Copper currently trades towards the lower end of a USD 9,842.2-10,001.8/t.
• China is to add cobalt and copper to its state metal reserves.

Geopolitics: Middle East

• Hamas says it is still studying the US proposal and the other proposed ideas in order to reach a deal that ensures hostage releases, the end of the war, and Israeli withdrawal.
• Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei says the “US need to know if they mess around with Iran, it will receive a hard slap”; “has no proxies in the region, those groups act independently”.
• Israel’s cabinet voted to fire the head of Shin Bet Ronen Bar, according to AP.
• US National Security Adviser Waltz said Israel has every right to defend its people from Hamas terrorists and the ceasefire would have been extended if Hamas released all remaining hostages, but they chose war instead.

Geopolitics: Ukraine

• Russia’s Kremlin says Russian President Putin’s order not to strike Ukrainian energy infrastructure remains in force; attack on Russian Gas transit station in Sudzha shows Ukrainian President Zelensky cannot be trusted.
• Kyiv Post reports “Putin’s forces shelled the Sudzha gas metering station in Russia’s Kursk region with artillery in order to blame Ukraine — the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces”.
• Explosions were reported in the sky of Ukraine’s capital and air defences were working to counter a large-scale attack with drones, while it was also reported that Russian drones hit civilian targets in Odesa on Thursday night.
• US reportedly seeks to reopen terms of a Ukraine minerals deal, according to FT.
• Germany, Italy, Poland, UK, and Canada leaders are to meet in Paris next week to discuss Ukraine, while French President Macron said the European meeting next week is to discuss ways to accelerate immediate military support for Ukraine and will discuss plans to strengthen the Ukrainian army if an agreement is reached with Russia.
• EU’s Costa said he believes EU member states will increase pledges of support to Ukraine.
• Russia’s presidential security adviser Shoigu arrived in North Korea and is to meet with North Korea’s leader.
• Russian Investigative Committee opens a case over explosion at Sudzha gas metering station in Russia’s Kursk region organised by Ukraine; station significantly damaged in a blast.

US Event Calendar

• Nothing scheduled

DB’s Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap

As London basks in temperatures warmer than Ibiza, a renewed focus on trade fears derailed a recovery in risk assets yesterday, with the S&P 500 closing -0.22% lower last night, though it’s still up +2.56% from last Thursday’s close, having so far only spent that one day in -10% correction territory. Yesterday was also the first day in a while where European stocks bore the brunt of the negativity with the FTSE-MIB (-1.32%) and the DAX (-1.24%) leading the declines. The Stoxx 600 (-0.43%) was helped by exposure to UK stocks with the FTSE (-0.05%) outperforming even after a slightly hawkish hold from the BoE (more later).

European markets had seen a sharp slide lower just before 9am GMT yesterday with no real explanation but by mid-morning they had stabilised and range traded into the close. There was no associated story but there was a lot of chatter about Mr Trump’s social media post from the early hours of the London morning that suggested the Fed should be cutting rates as “…. US Tariffs start to transition (ease!) their way into the economy. Do the right thing. April 2nd is Liberation Day in America!!!”. In an era of analysing every nuance of every post, the clear suggestion was that this implied that tariffs would cause some economic pain ahead. And while markets recovered during the US morning session, they then turned lower again with the S&P falling from +0.63% at the peak to close down -0.22%. So a modest but fairly broad-based decline, with 65% of the S&P lower on the day and the equal-weighted version of the index down -0.37%.

Bonds also had a topsy-turvy session, with 10yr Treasuries yields a mere -0.5bps to 4.24% by the close after having traded as low as 4.17% amid the earlier risk-off tone. The reversal of the bond rally was helped by a decent batch of US data. Existing home sales saw an unexpected acceleration in February (4.26m vs 3.95m expected and 4.08m previous), although there may be some residual seasonality in the data as sales have seen large February spikes for the past three years. Meanwhile, the latest initial jobless claims (223k vs 224k expected) painted a steady picture of the US labour market.

Looking forward to today, the vote on the debt brake reform in the Bundesrat starts at 9.30am CET this morning with news at the start of the week that Bavaria will support the bill meaning that its safe passage probability is even higher than it was in the Bundestag where it passed comfortably on Tuesday. Assuming it passes, it is theoretically possible that the AfD and the Left could seek an abstract judicial review at the Federal Constitutional Court as soon as the new Bundestag is constituted, which sits for the first time next Tuesday, but the Left have said they won’t file a complaint alongside the AfD. The potential legal challenges have steadily fallen away over the last couple of weeks and the story will likely move onto coalition talks next week with the expectations that this will be completed before the end of March and Friedrich Merz to be sworn in as chancellor shortly after Easter.

As for the BoE, our economist Sanjay Raja, believes the on-hold decision (at 4.5%) was on the hawkish side with the MPC’s vote tally and messaging highlighting growing concern around the disinflation progress in the midst of weaker demand. The biggest surprise was that only one member voted for a cut with 8 voting for unchanged. We thought there would be 2 doves. Sanjay still thinks there’ll be four 25bps cuts this year but his conviction levels have fallen. The risk is now that they could pause between May and November when CPI is expected to push up against 4% YoY. Ultimately, Sanjay thinks that beyond that the labour market will cool, pay settlements fall, tariffs will bite, and a terminal rate of 3.25% will be hit. See his report here. The hawkish lean left the probability of a cut in May at 64% down from 72% at the prior close. 10yr Gilts slightly underperformed, climbing +1.0bps with 2yr yields +3.5bps in contrast with German and French 2yr yields which were -2.3bps and -2.5bps lower, respectively.

Elsewhere in Europe, the SNB cut rates by 25bps as expected to 0.25%, their lowest since September 2022, but signalled that it doesn’t anticipate further easing as things stand. And in Sweden, the Riksbank kept rates on hold at 2.25% and also reiterated that it expects stable rates ahead. In other central bank news, Bank of Canada Governor Macklem said that the hotter inflation print the previous day “got our attention”.

Sticking with Canada, the Globe and Mail reported that new Prime Minister Mark Carney is expected this weekend to call a snap election for late April. An election is due by October at the latest. The former Bank of England and Bank of Canada governor took over from Trudeau as the head of the Liberal party earlier this month, and while the Liberals had been more than 20pts behind the opposition Conservatives in opinion polls at the turn of the year, the latest polls now show them in a slight lead in a dramatic turnaround since Trudeau’s decision to step down and amid increased tensions with the US.

Turkish markets remained in the headlines yesterday as Türkiye’s central bank raised its overnight lending rate by 2pp to 46% in a surprise meeting. The Turkish lira saw modest rebound (+0.25%) and has been trading in a narrow range close to 38 on the dollar, hinting at a concerted effort to stabilise the currency after its initially sharp sell-off on Wednesday.
In commodities, Brent crude oil prices (+2.13%) rose to their highest level since the end of February at $72.29/bbl after the US for the first time sanctioned a Chinese refinery for allegedly buying Iranian oil, raising the prospect of stricter US sanctions enforcement against Iran. Meanwhile, copper (+0.03%) hovered within 1% of its record high from last May, after extending its YTD gains to +26% YTD on risks of US duties and stronger China data.

Asian equity markets are sharply lower in China but generally slightly higher elsewhere. The Hang Seng (-2.14%) is leading losses in the region followed by the CSI (-1.30%) and the Shanghai Composite (-1.06%). Elsewhere, the Nikkei (+0.17%) is trading slightly higher with the KOSPI (+0.06%) and the S&P/ASX 200 (+0.16%) also hanging on to gains. US stock futures are a fraction lower and 10yr US yields around a basis point higher.

Coming back to Japan, Japan’s core inflation came in at 3.0% y/y in February (v/s +2.9% expected) but lower than January’s figure of 3.2%. At the same time, headline inflation rose +3.7% y/y in February (v/s +3.5% expected) easing from a two-year high of+ 4.0% seen last month, thus staying above the BOJ’s 2% target for 35 straight months. The “core-core” inflation rate climbed to +2.6% y/y from +2.5% in the month before and maybe a touch above expectations especially as the print nearly rounded up to 2.7%. Following the data release, yields on the 10yr JGBs are +1.3bps higher trading at 1.52%. See our economist’s take on the inflation release here.

Now to the day ahead, the Bundesrat is voting today on the huge fiscal package ahead of the new Bundestag session starting next Tuesday. Data releases include the UK GfK consumer confidence for March whilst in France there’s the manufacturing confidence for March and retail sales for February. Additionally, Eurozone consumer confidence for March and Italy’s current account balance for January will also be published. Outside of the Eurozone, we have Canada retail sales for January. Otherwise from central banks, we’ll hear from the Fed’s Williams and the ECB’s Escriva.

Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump said a New York Times story reporting that Elon Musk will be briefed at the Pentagon on U.S. military plans for a potential war with China is “fake news” and “completely untrue.”

The report, which cited multiple anonymous U.S. officials, said Musk would be given a presentation of the plans by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other top U.S. military leaders including Adm. Christopher W. Grady, the acting chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“The Fake News is at it again, this time the Failing New York Times,” Trump wrote in a March 20 post on the social media platform Truth Social.

“They said, incorrectly, that Elon Musk is going to the Pentagon tomorrow to be briefed on any potential ‘war with China.’ How ridiculous?”

Trump added that China “will not even be mentioned or discussed,” when Musk, a special adviser to the president, visits the Pentagon on March 21.

“How disgraceful it is that the discredited media can make up such lies,” Trump added. 

“Anyway, the story is completely untrue!!!”

Hegseth wrote on social media platform X that he looked forward to welcoming Musk to the Pentagon for “an informal meeting about innovation, efficiencies & smarter production” that would not be “a meeting about ’top secret China war plans.’”

“The fake news delivers again,” Hegseth added.

The story also prompted a response from the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson Sean Parnell, who wrote on the social media platform X that the report was “brazenly & maliciously wrong.”

“Elon Musk is a patriot,” Parnell said. “We are proud to have him at the Pentagon.”

Democratic lawmakers and other groups have raised concerns about potential conflicts of interest Musk may have because of his involvement with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), given his stakes in electric vehicle maker Tesla and SpaceX, a U.S. space technology company and major aerospace contractor for the federal government.

Through DOGE, Musk is leading the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the size of government and make sure each agency’s mission is in line with the president’s “America First” vision, an objective the president has emphasized in multiple executive orders.

Among those questioning Musk’s role is Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who has called for the White House to release Musk’s financial disclosure report. He said that as a special government employee, the businessman is subject to federal conflict of interest laws that bar government workers from participating in matters in which they have a financial interest.

The White House has previously said that Musk is a “special government employee” under the Trump administration and acts only as an adviser.

White House officials have also said Musk will recuse himself if any conflicts of interest arise between his business dealings and his role in cutting federal government spending.

Musk has vowed to remain transparent with the American public, telling a White House press briefing on Feb. 11 that you “can’t have an autonomous federal bureaucracy,” and “you have to have one that’s responsive to the people.”

Musk visited the National Security Agency (NSA) on March 12, one week after saying the intelligence agency “needs an overhaul.”

NSA Director Gen. Timothy Haugh, who is also the commander of the U.S. Cyber Command (CYBERCOM), hosted Musk during his first visit to the agency, an NSA spokesperson told The Epoch Times.

“NSA and CYBERCOM are focused on the President, [secretary of defense], and [director of national intelligence’s] priorities; meetings with key advisors ensure we are aligned,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

The New York Times story comes as tensions between Washington and Beijing have increased in recent years amid differences over technology, trade tariffs, and cybersecurity, as well as Taiwan and the origins of COVID-19.

There are no signs a war is imminent between the two nations.

The Epoch Times contacted the White House, The New York Times, and SpaceX for comment.

Three days after an Oval Office visit with President Trump and Elon Musk, UFC fighter and strident anti-immigration hawk Conor McGregor announced he is running for the Irish presidency.

McGregor’s announcement centered on his opposition to the EU’s European Migration Pact, which would streamline screening and asylum processing, with other provisions also aimed at accelerating the deportations of people whose asylum claims are rejected. Last summer, the Irish government committed to the pact, and must start implementing it by June 12, 2026. In preparation for that milestone, Ireland will need to pass several legislative acts so its migration practices conform to the pact.   

In making his announcement via his accounts on X and Instagram, the 36-year-old McGregor attacked Ireland’s adoption of the European Migration Pact and promised to give the Irish people a chance to veto it, rather than the implementation being decided by House of the Oireachtas and the president :  

“The next presidential election must take place by 11 Nov 2025. Who else will stand up to Government and oppose this bill? Any other Presidential candidate they attempt to put forward will be of no resistance to them. I will!

For clarity also, as President, I would put forth this bill to referendum. Although I oppose greatly this pact, it is neither mine nor governments choice to make. It is the people of Irelands choice!” 

The days of weak men creating horrid times for Ireland are over!

MARK MY WORDS.

— Conor McGregor (@TheNotoriousMMA) March 19, 2025

On his Monday visit to Washington, McGregor stepped to the microphone in White House briefing room and laid down a brief yet blistering condemnation of the state of affairs on the Emerald Isle. 

“What is going on in Ireland is a travesty. Our government is the government of zero action with zero accountability. Our money is being spent on overseas issues that have nothing to do with the Irish people. The illegal immigration racket is running ravage on the country. There are rural towns in Ireland that have been overrun in one swoop, that have become minority in one swoop…Irish-Americans need to hear this because if [these issues are not addressed], there will be no place to come home and visit.” 

Conor McGregor: “The illegal immigration racket is running ravage on [Ireland]. There are rural towns that have been overrun in one swoop.”

“Irish-Americans need to hear this because there will be no place to come home and visit.”pic.twitter.com/lyXumJwj2p

— Border Hawk (@BorderHawkNews) March 17, 2025

The Irish establishment left quickly criticized McGregor for his remarks. “St. Patrick’s Day around the world is a day rooted in community, humanity, friendship and fellowship,” said Prime Minister Micheál Martin via social media. “Conor McGregor’s remarks are wrong, and do not reflect the spirit of St Patrick’s Day, or the views of the people of Ireland.”

The Irish presidency is nothing like the American one. It’s largely ceremonial, with many of the president’s “authorities” actually being obligations to do what other branches and officials tell him to do. For example, laws passed by the legislature go to the Irish president for signature, but he has to sign them under penalty of impeachment. Similarly, the president carries the title of “Supreme Commander of Defence Forces,” but has zero military authority. The president does have some ability to influence the formation of government in the lower legislative house; thus far, that power has never been used. 

On his path to the presidency, McGregor will be dragging a ball and chain in the form of legal troubles. Last year, an Irish jury found him civilly liable for raping a woman in a hotel following a night of drug use. He’s appealed that result. He’s also been sued in Florida by a woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her in a Miami arena bathroom during the 2023 NBA finals. 

Given he’s an EU critic, there may be other barriers put in McGregor’s way, as best exemplified by the recent events in Romania, where candidates have been banned and arrested for merely voicing anti-EU and anti-NATO sentiments. 

Via America First Legal,

On Thursday, America First Legal (AFL) released explosive new documents obtained through ongoing litigation against the U.S. Department of State’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), exposing a vast, government-backed censorship operation to silence Americans under the guise of “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and “malinformation.” The documents reveal a disturbing alliance between the GEC, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the British Foreign, Commonwealth, Development Office (FCDO), and media censorship organizations, all working in lock-step to manipulate public discourse, control media narratives, and suppress free speech.

The GEC, which was forced to shut down in December 2024, was designed to “combat foreign disinformation abroad.” However, through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, AFL uncovered that the GEC engaged in state-sponsored propaganda, repeatedly using willing participants from private media organizations. Further, AFL’s lawsuit against the GEC revealed that USAID had created an internal “Disinformation Primer” that explicitly praised private sector censorship strategies and recommended further censorship tactics.

The new documents released by AFL show: 

• The GEC and USAID coordinated efforts to censor “COVID-19 misinformation” and counter “COVID-19 propaganda.” 
• The GEC collaborated with officials in the British Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office on disinformation efforts.
• The GEC coordinated with private media censorship firms, including Poynter and NewsGuard, which provided samples of its Misinformation Fingerprints artificial intelligence (AI) tool, designed to identify and rate websites based on their perceived “misinformation.”

I. The GEC and USAID coordinated to counter “COVID-19 Propaganda and Disinformation”

In a widely distributed email to USAID, the GEC’s “Liaison Planner to USAID” stated that GEC would like to “sustain dialogue and connectivity during these unprecedented times” to help counter “misinformation” surrounding COVID-19 despite USAID’s self-described mission being “to extend assistance to countries recovering from disaster, trying to escape poverty, and engaging in democratic reforms.” 

The documents show that GEC communicated with multiple branches of USAID, including “TF 2020-COVID 19,” “Digital Development,” “Asia Bureau ES Taskers,” “Asia Outreach,” “Conflict Prevention and Stabilization (CPS) Policy,” and “CPS Africa.” 

Additionally, GEC and USAID worked together on “counter-propaganda” and “Disinformation and COVID-19 related products,” ranging from a “KHARON” (risk analysis program) demo to monitoring “disinformation” narratives surrounding the 2020 Presidential Elections in Moldova.

II. Coordination with Internet Censors NewsGuard and Poynter

Two days after the 2020 U.S. Presidential election, NewsGuard Technologies’ General Manager, Matt Skibinski, started an email chain to pitch NewsGuard services. Included in this email chain were:  

• Park Advisors’ then-Director Christina Nemr is an Obama Administration State Department alum. According to her LinkedIn, Park Advisors “Designed and led multi-million public-private initiatives addressing security threats in the information environment, bridging gaps between emerging technologies and real-world operational needs. Built and managed a global platform that evaluated and connected tools with mission-critical challenges, supporting government adoption.”
  • The House Small Business Committee found that Park Advisors received a GEC cooperative agreement award of more than $6 million. Park Advisors then distributed subawards to several companies, including NewsGuard, the Atlantic Council, and the Global Disinformation Index, a project funded by George Soros that generated lists of conservative websites it urged advertising companies to boycott. Together, these groups, not subject to international restrictions like GEC was, tested disinformation products, which led to the creation of the “Disinfo Cloud,” an unclassified platform used by the U.S. federal government, the European Union, the U.K. government, the Australian government, and the Estonian government “to counter adversarial propaganda and disinformation.” 

• Government employees from the Department of State, the National Security Agency (NSA), and Department of Defense components, including the National Security Innovation Network (NSIN), U.S. Cyber Command, and the U.S. Army European Command. 

Skibinski showed samples of the new GEC/U.S Cybercommand Testbed Pilot (Misinformation Fingerprints). This program utilized artificial intelligence and machine learning to monitor “misinformation.” The House Small Business Committee report details that “there was no firewall in place to ensure that Federal resources were not being used to develop and promote technologies that would have domestic impacts.” 

While NewsGuard claims to be a fair arbiter of truthfulness, research by the Foundation For Freedom Online reveals how NewsGuard operates the enforcement arm of the censorship industry that rates websites based on how much “misinformation” each site publishes.

Additionally, on February 4, 2021, Vonda Wolcott, Senior Program Manager at the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, connected GEC’s Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) “expert” with Baybars Orsek from Poynter. AFL has shown how Poynter funds a global false-flag operation of international “fact-checkers” that claim to be independent but are, in reality, a tightly woven network funded by Poynter and the GEC. 

This email shows just how closely GEC and Poynter worked with GEC’s expert offering to “walk [Poynter] through GEC’s new M&E workbook.” 

III. U.S. Department of State Officials Shared Information to a Foreign Government

An email from January 8, 2021, shows the distribution of alleged “malinformation” from U.S. Department of State emails to official UK government officials in the British FCDO. AFL previously exposed coordination between other pro-censorship organizations and the U.S. and U.K. governments to censor American citizens’ speech.

These documents further show the now-defunct GEC’s widespread efforts to suppress so-called “misinformation,” often through collaborating with government agencies, foreign governments, NGOs, and the media to silence dissenting voices.

America First Legal will continue fighting to expose government censorship and will always defend the First Amendment.

Statement from Andrew Block, America First Legal Senior Counsel:

“The partnership between USAID and the Global Engagement Center is bad news for the American people. Add in the fact that they were coordinating with internet censorship enforcers at NewsGuard and Poynter, and you can start to see just how dangerous this unholy alliance is for free speech and free expression. Thankfully, the GEC is shuttered and USAID is being exposed — but lawmakers should take note of this example as they consider legislation to ensure the federal government actually serves American principles and interests,” said Andrew Block.

Read the documents here.

Follow us on social media for the latest updates on America First Legal’s fight to protect your constitutional rights!

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Britain’s busiest airport, Heathrow, suffered a massive power outage after a fire broke out at a nearby electrical substation in West London. Backup generators failed to kick on, forcing the airport to shut down and resulting in the cancellation of more than 1,000 flights. The disruption sent shockwaves through global air travel. While the cause of the incident remains under investigation, UK officials have stated there is “no suggestion of foul play.”

Friday morning in London with Heathrow Airport closed. pic.twitter.com/jufFvNKr42

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) March 21, 2025

UK Energy Minister Ed Miliband confirmed that a preliminary investigation into the electrical substation fire in West London has found “no suggestion” that it was caused by foul play.

Heathrow Airport closure due to an explosion at a fire at a power station nearby last night.

Had to deploy the drone rq and capture this#hayes #fire #london #heathrow pic.twitter.com/GAsOGP1uj0

— ‘ (@zain_018) March 21, 2025

“At the moment, the focus is on restoring power. We don’t yet have a full understanding of what caused the grid failure or the fire,” Miliband told LBC Radio, adding, “There’s no suggestion of foul play—just a catastrophic accident, as far as we can tell.”

This is the sub station fire that has caused blackouts and the 24 hr closure of Heathrow airport.

200,000 passenger will be affected… carnage. pic.twitter.com/eu00kCliVl

— Adam Brooks AKA EssexPR 🇬🇧 (@EssexPR) March 21, 2025

Heathrow, which serves nearly 90 airlines—including Britain’s national carrier, British Airways—has canceled about 1,300 flights, affecting over 145,000 passengers.

London-Heathrow will be closed for ALL of Friday due to a “significant power outage” caused by a fire in an electrical substation.

There are currently 120 aircraft in the air that will be diverting to alternate airports or returning to their origins. https://t.co/TEHf2kJO23 pic.twitter.com/Lot0lsJLz8

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) March 21, 2025

Heathrow Airport was handling 83.9 million passengers last year. That gives about 220k passengers per day. pic.twitter.com/kymm3VpH6N

— Flightradar24 (@flightradar24) March 21, 2025

Inbound flights to Heathrow were diverted to several airports, including ones nearby, such as Gatwick, London’s second-largest airport, and Manchester. According to Flightradar24 data, some flights were rerouted to international airports in Madrid, Paris, and Ireland.

“The diverted flights were already in the air, so that’s a diminishing number,” Heathrow Airport spokesperson Michael Murphy-Pyle told CNN.

In markets, shares of European airlines fell. IAG—the parent company of British Airways, Aer Lingus, Iberia, and others—declined around 2.5%. Air France-KLM shares were also down about 2%.

LoL!

I’m looking forward to Russia being blamed for the Heathrow fire 🔥. What are you waiting for, Starmer?

— Dmitry Medvedev (@MedvedevRussiaE) March 21, 2025

Developing…

Harvard: where the U.S. sends it’s best, it’s brightest and…it’s remedial math students?

That seems to be the case as social media has been abuzz in recent days over the university’s choice to offer a new Math course, called MA5, heading into the new year. The Harvard Crimson first wrote about the introduction of the new course back in September of last year, but discussion over the course has caught fire on X in recent days.

The course is called Math MA5, and it is an introductory course addressing gaps in students’ algebra skills, according to Brendan A. Kelly, Director of Introductory Math.

Which begs the question: why are students getting into Harvard incapable of doing algebra, which generally starts in junior high or high school?

Running alongside Math MA and MB, MA5 will have a five-day schedule, with students meeting “one of two instructors all five days” for “a variety of different activities” on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the Crimson wrote last year. 

Kelly cited the Covid-19 pandemic as a factor in students’ struggles, saying, “The last two years, we saw students who were in Math MA and faced a challenge that was unreasonable given the supports we had in the course.” The goal is to “create a course that really helps students step up to their aspirations.” 

While structured differently, MA5 will align with Math M. “Math MA5 is actually embedded in Math M,” Kelly said. “They’ll have the same psets, they’ll have the same office hours, they’ll have MQC, they’ll take the same exams… So if you’re in MA5, you will experience Math M.”

The Crimson says that freshmen placing into Math MA or 1A had to take an additional skills check to guide enrollment recommendations.

Kelly said the department “investigated a number of different strategies” before deciding to enhance Math M rather than add a prerequisite. “What we thought was the best thing to do… was to add more time and support into MA for students who would need it.”

The goal is to help students overcome early challenges. “If the first one doesn’t go well, it can really make these lasting waves in their pathways,” Kelly said. “We want to make sure that students are on a path to success starting from their first day.”

He acknowledged the challenge of MA5’s schedule but defended its benefits. “Five days a week does make it hard for some students’ schedules… but we do really think that five days a week is — in the trade-off — it’s gonna be worth it.”

God forbid students should take a couple days a week to learn…basic algebra…at Harvard.

Harvard had previously abolished SAT scores for admission during Covid, but reinstated the measures for the Class of 2030. 

Authored by Mike Fredenburg via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The Ukraine-Russia war and its innovative use of drones has significantly changed warfare. And while the use of drones as spotters for artillery and bombs is arguably their biggest contribution to death and destruction, Telegram is full of chilling FPV footage of kamikaze drones blowing up soldiers and equipment. Among the many measures being used to protect men and equipment from drone attacks is the shotgun, which along with being used by individual soldiers, is also being mounted on both ground and aerial platforms to provide defense against drones.

The drones these shotguns are being used to defend against are most often cheap and fragile. Sure, even cheap quadcopter-style drones are faster than a foot soldier and faster than most military ground vehicles, but at 30 to 46 mph they fly at the same speed, or slower than many game birds. A good example of a widely used commercial drone that is regularly weaponized is the $3,000 DJI Mavic 3. It weighs just under two pounds and has a no-load (no weapon) max level flight speed of 46 mph with a max flight time of 41 minutes. That means it is slower than a duck, a pigeon, quail, pheasant, or even a turkey. And when weighed down with an explosive device it is even slower, and its endurance and range greatly reduced.

Still, just as it is well-nigh impossible to shoot game birds flying at 50 to 70 mph with a rifle, so it is extremely difficult to hit a drone with an assault rifle that is flying at you to blow you up. That is why an increasing number of soldiers have taken to carrying shotguns with them to be used as a last-ditch defense to shoot down incoming kamikaze drones as well as FPV drones, positioning themselves over the soldiers to drop grenades on them.

With this in mind, Ukraine bought 4,000 BTS-12 bullpup mag-fed shotguns to provide some of its soldiers with last-ditch line of defense against drones. Beyond the BTS-12, Ukrainian soldiers have been using the Safari HG-105M and the Benelli M4 A.I. Drone Guardian, whose design gives it more range and more penetration. Russia is also equipping its troops with a variety of shotguns, including the 20-round AK-style VEPR-12, and the MR-155, a more traditional semi-auto shotgun that can hold eight rounds.

Furthermore, shotgun rounds optimized to destroy drones have also been developed. An example of these rounds are two rounds developed by Rostec. In brief, these shotgun shells are loaded with pellets whose size is optimized for destroying drones. And because drones are made of metal and hard plastics, the pellets themselves are harder than those used against game birds. One of the rounds has chemicals that allow it to act as a tracer. Such tracer rounds can be very effective in guiding follow-on rounds into an attacking drone.

Russian soldiers desperately dealing with the onslaught of drones have developed mini shotgun shells for their AK-74 assault rifles. Using this modification, each AK-74 round fired delivers seven 0.177-inch BB-sized steel bearings downrange. This means a seven-round burst puts just under 50 steel pellets downrange with muzzle velocities much greater than that of a shotgun. While some Western writers have dismissed this innovation as being irrelevant, such dismissals are not supported with evidence. Another Ak-74 modification is to enable under-barrel grenade launchers to fire a single 12-gauge shotgun round. While this is hardly the ultimate drone defense, it is better than firing rifle rounds and is yet another example of shotgun type devices being used to defend against drones.

But the use of shotguns goes well beyond the weapons individual soldiers can carry into battle. Both Ukraine and Russia have developed drones carrying shotguns to shoot down other drones. In a recent case, a larger Ukrainian drone mounting shotguns was videoed shooting down three Russian UAVs. Russian defense contractor Almaz-Antey has developed a unique and inexpensive drone that features a 10-round, fully automatic, VEPR-12 shotgun in a stabilized mount designed to shoot down drones.

Russia is also mounting shotguns on some of its vehicles. This includes deploying anti-drone guns with 24 shotgun barrels on a single mount on its tactical buggies. Such a setup can put a very large and dense cloud of hundreds of damaging pellets into the path of oncoming drones.

However, while shotguns have the potential to be at least somewhat effective against drones, they will not have any chance to be effective unless soldiers know the drone is targeting them, can spot the drone, accurately target it, and do all of this in a matter of seconds. And it also requires the right kind of tactics.

Here is a very brief example pulled from a Ukrainian Special Forces Command report analyzing Russia’s efforts to adapt modern-day drone warfare. In brief, Russian troops will be equipped with a passive detector using acoustic and electromagnetic detection that can detect and track drones to 1,000 meters off. Once aware of the threatening drone(s), Russian soldiers can orient themselves to be ready to engage the drone(s) with their various types of shotgun type weapons as well and any other drone countermeasures they have available. Russian command is also recommending placing a dedicated shooter with a shotgun at the back of every military vehicle near the front lines in case electronic warfare systems fail to disable the flying explosives.

Though the above example involves Russian troops, it does lay out some very basic aspects of what effective drone defense must embody. Ultimately, shotguns are only one of many ways warfighters can defend themselves against drones, but given enough warning of a pending drone attack, they provide a last-ditch defense well worth employing.

And yes, your father’s double barreled 12-gauge shotgun in the hands of a skilled soldier who sees the drone coming absolutely, positively has a good chance to take it out.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

On Thursday Hamas for the first time in months launched a barrage of rockets toward Tel Aviv. There had been no such attacks out of Gaza since the last round of ceasefire took hold two months ago.

“The Qassam Brigades bombarded Tel Aviv with a barrage of rockets in response to the Zionist massacres against civilians,” the group’s armed wing announced on Telegram.

But despite alert sirens sounding in several districts, two of the projectiles fell in an open field, with one intercepted by anti-air defense measures.

Before the ceasefire, Hamas rocket attacks focused on southern Israel, however, Thursday’s rocket attack was “Hamas’s first on central Israel since October 7, 2024, the one-year anniversary of the Hamas-led onslaught that sparked the ongoing war,” Israeli media noted.

The salvo sent people across Tel Aviv scurrying into bomb shelters and basements. The Israeli military (IDF) subsequently warned Gazans, “Terror organizations are once again launching their rockets from within civilian areas. We have warned this area many times.”

Gaza health officials have said over 700 Palestinians were killed by renewed Israeli airstrikes only over the last two days.

Israel is once again facing war on multiple fronts. The Houthis on Thursday launched their second ballistic missile attack on central Israel since the Gaza war flared up again.

“The YAF missile force carried out a military operation targeting Ben Gurion Airport in the occupied Jaffa region with a Palestine-2 hypersonic ballistic missile. This operation successfully achieved its goal,” announced the Houthis.

The Houthis further claimed another attack on the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier, but there’s been no indication it was hit. This marks the Shia group’s fifth such attempted attack on the Truman carrier.

WATCH 🔴

Hamas proudly releases footage of its long-range rocket attack toward Tel Aviv from earlier today.

They know that all of southern Gaza will be taken over, yet they still boast. pic.twitter.com/6OXCrss9rn

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) March 20, 2025

Meanwhile as deadly conflict is fast heating up in the region once again, President Trump has declared he “fully supports Israel, and the IDF, and the actions that they’ve taken in recent days.”

At this point the planned-for second phase of the ceasefire is dead. This would have seen the return of all the hostages, theoretically leading to a permanent peace.

Authored by James Gorrie via The Epoch Times,

Today, a significant part of China’s geopolitical calculus rests on its allegiance with Russia, a critical but by no means unbreakable ally. The war in Ukraine, now grinding through its third year, has exposed vulnerabilities in this partnership, as has the potential peace deal being brokered by the Trump administration.

A Global Strategy

In fact, the United States “playing the Russian card” should be viewed not just as an effort to stop the bloodshed in Ukraine but as a global strategy to undermine Beijing’s influence with Moscow and other countries worldwide. This bold move flips the script on the Nixon-era triangulation. Beginning in the early 1970s, the United States countered the Russian-led Soviet Union’s global influence by engaging China diplomatically and economically, which served to counterbalance the United States’ top global adversary.

The idea has merit. Russia’s economy is battered, its military stretched thin, and its global isolation is growing. Western sanctions have choked its access to technology and markets, leaving it desperate for a lifeline.

Furthermore, Moscow is now the weaker partner in its relations with Beijing, reliant on China for trade and diplomatic cover. If the United States flips Russia, China loses a counterweight to Western pressure, leaving it more isolated against a unified NATO and its Indo–Pacific allies.

Making Beijing Even More Vulnerable

As for China, it finds itself in a vulnerable position as well. Its dependence on Russia runs deep, especially for resources. For example, Russia supplies more than 15 percent of China’s crude oil imports and vast amounts of natural gas via pipelines like Power of Siberia. China also sees Russia’s freshwater reserves—Lake Baikal alone holds 20 percent of the world’s unfrozen freshwater—as a hedge against its own water scarcity.

Losing or even reducing access to Russia’s resources, including its arable land and timber, would put huge pressure on China to find alternatives at a much higher cost. But that could well be the outcome of a U.S.–Russia rapprochement.

A One-Sided Relationship

What’s more, trade with China—$240 billion in 2023—keeps Moscow afloat, but it’s a one-sided relationship. China buys cheap Russian energy while selling finished goods, leaving Russia a junior partner. Moscow is not comfortable and even resents playing second fiddle to Beijing.

On the other hand, the United States could offer a sweeter deal: access to global markets, investment in infrastructure, and a tech lifeline. For Russian President Vladimir Putin, who thrives on pragmatism, the allure of rebuilding Russia’s economy might outweigh ideological loyalty to Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

The potential for such a development is more than hypothetical. A negotiated settlement in Ukraine where Russia retains some territorial gains but withdraws from most of Ukraine could be framed as a “win” for domestic consumption. In return, the United States could push NATO to pull back from its easternmost footprint—perhaps even reverting to pre-1997 boundaries, as Russia has long demanded, or a planned return to prior agreed-upon limits along with an enforced neutrality for non-NATO nations bordering Russia, like Ukraine.

A New US–Russia Détente?

Such an arrangement wouldn’t dismantle NATO but could ease Moscow’s paranoia about encirclement, making a pivot away from China palatable. It’s a low-cost concession for the United States: NATO’s core remains intact, and Russia’s ties to China diminish.

Of course, it’s not yet a reality. Putin and Russia’s elite are wary of U.S./NATO promises. Plus, China could counter with sweeter deals—more loans, more weapons tech. But that remains to be seen.

The Ukraine leadership is also a wild card. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is proving himself to be less predictable and more capricious than the Trump administration anticipated. What’s more, Western European NATO members are all less inclined to seek a peace settlement with Putin.

Therefore, part of the Trump administration’s effort is to force Ukraine to the peace table, which is happening as I write this, and convince NATO members such as the United Kingdom, France, and Germany to accept a peace deal. The United States must also find a way to meet Russia’s conditions while not losing Ukraine’s agreement to a cease-fire. Both should be achievable, but time will tell.

The US Has Better Cards Than China

However, as far as Moscow is concerned, Washington has better cards to play than Beijing in terms of market size, technological edge, and the relief of a powerful NATO backing off Russia’s border countries—all of those appeal to Moscow.

At the same time, such a deal would add salt to the wound of the Chinese regime, which already finds itself in the Trump administration’s crosshairs concerning the Panama Canal, rising trade tariffs, and the accelerating American economic decoupling from China.

At the moment, Trump is showing both a carrot and a stick to Putin. At the same time, China’s shrinking economy and growing diplomatic isolation from U.S. actions become a greater negative going forward.

This isn’t just a hypothetical for the Chinese regime—it’s a nightmare scenario that threatens its strategic depth, resource security, and regional dominance.

The stakes are high, and China has plenty to lose.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

Let’s start with that phone call. The Kremlin readout is quite sober – but it does reveal a few nuggets. There is no comprehensive deal – yet – between Moscow and Washington. Far from it: we are just in the initial tentative stage of talking and talking about several interconnected dossiers.

President Putin gave absolutely nothing away. The agreed-upon pause on attacks on energy infrastructure – not energy and (italics mine) infrastructure – spells out as Putin imposing a stop on dangerous Ukrainian hits on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant.

That may be lost among all the Western hysteria; but there are two absolute conditions expressed by Moscow for anything in this riddle to start complying with objective reality – and not muddle along as a reality show narrative trainwreck:

1.“The settlement in Ukraine must take into account the unconditional need to eliminate the root causes of the crisis, Russia’s legitimate security interests.”

2.“The key condition for preventing the escalation of the conflict should be a complete cessation of foreign military aid and the provision of intelligence information to Kiev.”

US special envoy Witkoff is spinning that ceasefire “details” will be ironed out on Sunday in Saudi Arabia. No matter the amount of shrieking, Kiev will have to accept it.

Putin-Trump did not spend over 2 hours just talking hockey, hazy Black Sea navigation prospects and a quite limited energy infrastructure missile strike one-month pause.

In this incandescent juncture, what matters is off the record. And that might as well have been Iran. And the prospect of serious Hard Rain fallin’.

I’ve stepped in the middle of seven sad forests
I’ve been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard

A certain psychopathological entity in West Asia is obsessed to ram all its opponents through the mouth of a graveyard. Putin must have had the chance to explain to Trump that Russia respects the UN Charter and abides by international law. Russia and Iran – top BRICS members – signed a comprehensive strategic partnership last January in Moscow. Russia provides detailed ISR/air defense/EW intel to Tehran.

A proverbially hysterical narrative now imprints the notion that Tel Aviv – courting Trump 2.0 backing – is ready to inflict airstrikes on Iran to “prevent it from going nuclear”. Tehran, as detailed by Ayatollah Khamenei, has no interest whatsoever in building a nuclear weapon.

There’s no way Russia will allow Israel – with crucial American backing – to wreak havoc on Iran. Even as Tehran is already capable to react to any attack, with devastating consequences. Without nuclear weapons – and even without Russian direct help.

Operation True Promise 2 – True Promise 3 is still on hold – had already demonstrated that Israel is absolutely defenseless against wave after wave of sophisticated Iranian missiles. Were the US under Trump 2.0 to be involved in a direct attack, all US military bases in West Asia would be incinerated, plus severe punishment to vassals hosting these bases. End result: oil prices skyrocketing, massive global economic crisis.

I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a-bleedin’
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken

While the self-proclaimed peacemaker was on the phone polishing the newest iteration of his Art of the Deal, genocidal psychopathological Zionists with hammers a-bleedin’ were unleashing wild wolves on displaced newborn babies – huddling in tents ablaze in Khan Yunis.

And ten thousand EUrotrash talkers with their tongues all broken were mute on genocide but ready to erupt in shrieking delight pledging loyalty – and billions in funds – to the envoy of the former self-proclaimed Emir of Al-Nusra, a moderate head-chopper turned Hugo Boss-clad President.

All yelled a Eurovision-tinged Sieg Heil to the protégé’s mercenary “army”, duly backed by Qatari, British and European masters: ISIS-clad Salafi-jihadis, al-Qaeda remnants, assorted takfiris, Chechens, Uzbeks, Uighurs, a movable Terror Inc. on tour slashing Alawites, Christians, Shi’ites and even moderate Sunnis, facilitating the evisceration of Syria and the “donation” of large swathes of Syrian sovereign territory to Tel Aviv.

The Zionist SS Brussels Medusa von den Lugen gleefully showered the moderate head-chopper gangs – al-Qaeda R Us – with 2.5 billion euros. It was Qatar that pressured the European Commission (EC) to invite Jolani’s henchman turned Foreign Minister, Asaad al-Shaibani to the 9th Brussels Conference for Donors on Syria – even as at least 7,000 Alawites and Christians were being “slaughtered” by his goons, according to a Greek Member of the European Parliament, Nikolas Farantouris, who visited Damascus on March 8-9 and met, among others, with the Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch and the Near East.

In parallel the Exceptionalist “peace through strength” circus ringmaster – dubbed across vast swathes of the Arab street as “The Marmalade Moron” – brutally started bombing Ansarallah in Yemen, to force unbowed warriors to ditch their unwavering support for Palestine and wallow in submission.

Additionally, “Bomb, bomb, bomb – bomb bomb Iran” was back as the crypto-Beach Boys theme song, because in the end Tehran must by all means be turned into Syria, Jordan, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, South Yemen: a pitiful Quisling Zionist regime.

The destabilized but not broken Axis of Resistance is fighting titanic, simultaneous battles against the Axis of Genocidal Zion on several fronts: the psycho-killers in Tel Aviv; the Jolani mercenary army in Syria, de facto ground troops of Israel, simultaneously supported, ideologically, by Zionist Arab regimes and assorted Salafi/takfiri Islamic outfits blessing the massacre against Palestinians; the Eurotrash liberal totalitarians, who are financing Jolani; and Washington/Pentagon-bombed Ansarallah in Yemen.

Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, leader of Ansarallah, made it all very clear in his March 16 speech:

“Our decision to support the Palestinian people, including our move to block Israeli maritime navigation, that clearly targets the Israeli enemy and no one else, is aimed solely at pressuring Israel to open the crossings, allow the entry of humanitarian aid, and put an end to the starvation of Gaza.”

So Ansarallah will not be broken – whatever the Empire of Chaos throws against them:

“The US is the one turning the sea into a battlefield, thereby directly impacting maritime navigation and global trade. Our decision was only targeting Israeli ships, and will now extend to US ships, but they are the ones who turn the sea into a battlefield and threaten maritime navigation. It is essential that all nations recognize who truly threatens international waters and the movement of ships.”

Compared to Yemeni courage, EUrotrash cowards might yearn, in their wildest dreams, to sound like thunder but are more likely to drown under a massive wave of irrelevance – to the sound of drummers whose hands are a-blazin’, bangin’ the Syria jihadi song. They shouldn’t even bother to whisper – because nobody is listenin’.

I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin’
Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world
Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin’
Heard ten thousand whisperin’ and nobody listenin’

The batshit crazy Estonian chick with the IQ of an undernourished worm, masquerading as EU foreign policy chief, wants no less that 40 billion euros for “military aid” to country 404. Hungary, France, Italy, Spain and Portugal emitted a resounding “No”: after all none have even a sliver of that kind of money.

Even Germany hasn’t signed off on its own €3 billion pledge – although the accumulated dementia never stops: the future BlackRock chancellor is convinced that “Putin has declared war on all of Europe.”

No one on Trump 2.0 even bothers to address a word to the Estonian worm: yes, “nobody is listenin’.” Batshit crazy – and irrelevant.

For Trump 2.0, the whole EUro trash Cage aux Folles spectacle is irrelevant: from the €800 billion ReArm Europe military scam to the Macron-Starmer Dumb and Dumber politico double down, both clowns so eager to deploy 30,000 unsuspecting cannon-fodder items to country 404 when their “security” simply will not be guaranteed by Mama Pentagon.

The message is as stark as Hard Rain: you may not even qualify as a convenient tool for us anymore. At best you may be repositioned as a – rotten – basket of resources. You’re on the menu. Like the former Global South in the previous century. Now it’s your turn.

The imperial projections of a bunch of Hollow Men

The possibility remains that bombastic “peace through strength” Trump is trying to weave a web of deceit facing chess-master Putin while the EUrotrash set up a Syrian-style buffer – with European troops securing Ukraine’s most sensitive zones. All that would be masking the Zio-con axis, once again, revamping their obsession on “eliminating” Iran from the new Primakov triangle in BRICS (Russia-Iran-China instead of Russia-India-China).

According to this purely wishful thinking script, profiting from a “weak” Iran the Empire of Chaos would once again be reigning supreme in West Asia, manipulating energy prices to undermine Russia’s economy while compromising China’s energy security.

The key spanner in these proverbially childish works – a mere imperial projection – is that Putin is not trying to be part of the imperial club. Putin and several of the Security Council members in Moscow have accumulated piles of doctorates on Western deceit, coups, outright lies, blatant betrayals and hardcore geoeconomic sabotage.

Putin, Medvedev, Patrushev, Naryshkin, Lavrov, they all know that this war the current, breathless circus ringmaster is trying to end was always about breaking Russia, as well as containing China, and designed mostly as a Hail Mary pass to salvage the fast-declining Empire of Chaos.

And all that brings us to Spengler, as re-examined in this superb analysis, and to where Hard Rain is mostly gonna fall with no mercy.

When it comes to Europe, we are now dealing with Faustian men that don’t even qualify as T. S. Eliot’s hollow men, as “Europe has forgotten how to breed conquerors.” The Spenglerian metaphor for “the suffocation of a young civilization by the corpse of an old one” does apply. Yet Russian was never Faustian: more like Tolstoyan.

All of us who have been spending quality time in Russia after the start of the SMO do carry the feeling that it’s as if “the Third Rome was always waiting, biding its time, watching as Europe gutted itself on the altar of its own hubris.”

Now Russia seems to have shed “its Western skin”, turning to “its own roots – Eurasian, Orthodox, steppe-born.” I was personally overcome by this cultural/spiritual illumination not only in white nights in Moscow, Kazan or Vladivostok, but mostly while traveling in the black soil of Novorossiya – where the “rules-based international order” came to die.

The fragmented West is indeed trapped in a Baudrillard-style total simulation of its own making – while Russia is operating full tilt in objective reality. And indeed “this is why the West cannot win in Ukraine. It fights as a bureaucratic entity, not as a people. And Russia, for all its flaws, fights as a people.”

The current Hollow Men masquerading as Europe’s political “leaders” tough should not be underestimated. They will get their revenge – over their own European fellow citizens.

Cue to Christine “Vuitton” Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank (ECB): “The digital euro is more crucial than ever.”

Translation: all European bank accounts will eventually be transferred to the ECB. Now couple that with the proclamation by the Toxic Medusa in Brussels: “This month [March 2025] the European Commission will present the Savings and Investment Union. We will turn private savings (italics mine) into much-needed investments.”

Extra translation: it’s the private savings of European citizens that will be stolen and invested in 800 billion warmongering euros for Europe’s “defense” against the perennial “Russian threat”. Hard Rain – on each and every European citizen.

You may be asking why a beat poem structured as a psalm, composed on a typewriter in Greenwich Village in New York City in 1962, slightly before the Cuban missile crisis, by a 21-year old recently arrived from an industrial belt in Minnesota is telling our big story today of hubris and deceit. That’s the unconquerable power of Art.

I’m a-goin’ back out ’fore the rain starts a-fallin’
I’ll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest
Where the people are many and their hands are all empty
Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters
Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison
Where the executioner’s face is always well hidden
Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten
Where black is the color, where none is the number

Pellets of poison will be flooding the waters; souls may be forgotten – especially those of the Hollow Men; some – across the Global Majority – may be even resourceful enough to emerge from the depths of the deepest black forest; but most of all, as the executioner’s face remains quite well hidden, many will finally be able to see who he really is.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.