USD: Trump accuses Russia of being partners with a Gas Killing Animal

WOW. There truly is never a dull moment with Donald Trump at the helm and yesterday there was yet more controversy, as he took to Twitter (where else?) to threaten Russia. To think that World War 3 could actually be instigated via the most powerful man in the world expressing himself on a social media platform is absolutely terrifying. He said that Russia should get ready for missiles fired at Syria, but perhaps this is just a means of trying to demonstrate he didn’t collude with Russia during the election campaign.

The main release was the inflation rate which came in as expected at 2.4% year on year and the minutes from the Federal Open Market Committee were released. They showed that all Fed members see “the outlook for the economy beyond the current quarter had strengthened in recent months” and that “all participants expected inflation on a 12-month basis to move up in coming months.” This isn’t news for the markets as the consensus remains that the Fed will operate a gradual pace for rate hikes. The question is whether we see three or four hikes this year. There was a muted reaction in equity markets, treasuries and in the dollar upon release of the minutes.

Today we will see initial jobless claims up to 7 April. They are expected to fall to 230,000 from 242,000 the month before.