The saga of Minister May
Improved not one whit yesterday
When Boris resigned
Pound Sterling declined
And her party’s now in disarray

The news from the UK continues to dominate market headlines as less than twenty-four hours after the resignation of the Brexit Minister David Davis, Boris Johnson, a Brexit hardliner and Foreign Minister also resigned from PM May’s cabinet. While PM May replaced both men quickly, the problem is one of appearances in that she seems to be losing control over her government. The market’s immediate reaction was to sell the pound (it fell 0.7% yesterday after the news and has maintained those losses) as concerns over a leadership challenge and potentially a new election were brought to the fore. However, since then, it seems things have quieted down a bit and there is even talk that this could be a Sterling positive as it may result in a softer Brexit with less economic impact. In the meantime, this morning’s data showed that GDP has been rebounding from Q1’s flat reading, with the monthly May reading rising 0.3% and although IP data was soft (-0.4% in May), Construction was strong (+1.6%) and it appears that Governor Carney will still have enough ammunition to justify a rate increase next month. The risk to that outlook is if a leadership challenge emerges in Parliament and PM May is deposed. In that event, market participants may take a dimmer view of the near future depending on who replaces her.

Away from the British Isles, however, there is less excitement in the G10 economies. The big US news remains political with President Trump naming Brett Kavanaugh to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. However, on the economic front, there has been precious little news or commentary. In fact, until Thursday’s CPI reading, I expect the US story to be benign unless something surprising happens in the Treasury auctions beginning today, where the US is raising $69 billion via 3yr, 10yr and 30yr auctions.

From Germany we saw the ZEW surveys disappoint with the Sentiment Index falling to -24.7, its lowest print since December 2011 during the European bond crisis. This has encouraged a reversal in the euro, which is down 0.3% this morning after a week of gains. As well, the other, admittedly minor, Eurozone data also pointed to modest Eurozone weakness, thus giving the overall impression that the recent stabilization on the continent may be giving way to another bout of weakness. However, we will need to see more important data weaken to confirm that outcome. Certainly, Signor Draghi is convinced that the worst is behind them, but he has always been an optimist.

In the emerging markets, Turkey has once again stolen the headlines as President Erdogan named his son-in-law as Minister of Finance and Economics, thus following through on his threat promise to take firmer control over monetary policy. In the cabinet reshuffle he also removed the last vestiges of central banking experience so I would look for inflation in Turkey to start to really take off soon, and the currency to fall sharply. And that is despite the fact that it fell 3% yesterday after the announcement. In fact, I would look for more moves of that nature and a print above 5.00 in the not too distant future.

But other than that, while the dollar is stronger this morning, it is not running away. The broad theme today seems to be modest profit taking by traders who had been running short dollar positions, and so a bit of further strength would be no surprise. On the data front, the NFIB Small Business Optimism Index was released earlier at 107.2, stronger than expected and still showing that small businesses remain confident in the economic situation for now. The JOLTs jobs report comes at 10:00 and should simply confirm that the employment situation in the US remains robust. My gut tells me that modest further dollar strength is on tap for today, but really, barring a political bombshell, I expect that things will be very quiet overall. It is the middle of summer after all.

Good luck
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