TheChek News Flow

There will be no deal between Greece and its lenders on Friday that would unlock loans and enable vital debt relief talks, despite some progress on the reforms Athens must implement in exchange, euro zone and IMF officials said on Friday.

"Don't expect any deals today," the chairman of euro zone finance ministers Jeroen Dijsselbloem told reporters, noting however, he was "hearing good news from Athens" on headway made in negotiations on a Greek reform package.

"There is more work to be done. We are determined to continue the work. We're not there yet," International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde said.

The package of reforms is aimed at producing a primary surplus of 3.5 percent of gross domestic product in 2018 "and beyond", according to a deal between Athens and euro zone governments signed last August.

But there is disagreement between Greece, the euro zone and the IMF on whether the measures, which include pension and income tax reform and setting up a privatization fund and a scheme to deal with bad loans, will be enough to reach that number.

The IMF believes that as things stand now, instead of 3.5 percent of GDP, Greece will only achieve a primary surplus - the budget surplus before debt-servicing costs - equivalent to 1.5 percent of economic output in 2018.

The Fund and the euro zone are also at odds over how long Greece will be able to maintain a primary surplus of 3.5 percent and therefore its ability to service its public debt in the long run. The debt stood at 177 percent of GDP last year.

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Germany and several other countries believe that with proper reforms Greece can keep such a surplus for decades and point to the fact that the country does not need to service its debt for the next seven years.

The Fund says this is unrealistic, and therefore the euro zone must grant the country debt relief through extending maturities and grace periods.

"Debt is a discussion we've not had before. The only thing we had was a promise that if the Greeks would commit fully and deliver on the program we would look at, if necessary, further debt measures," Dijsselbloem said.

The range of views on whether Greece needs debt relief stem from different macroeconomic assumptions among the lenders on Greek growth and fiscal performance over the next 30 years, officials said.

"There is more to be done and a debt sustainability to be agreed upon as well. It's critically important," Lagarde said.

But German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said debt relief talks were not a priority.

"That is not in the foreground. What is in the foreground is what has been agreed last year must be implemented," he said, referring to fiscal targets set last August.

Officials said differences over reforms in Greece have narrowed substantially in the last few days and have flagged the possibility of calling an extraordinary meeting of euro zone finance ministers on April 28 to clinch a deal.

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The insanity has now fully spilled into the commodity markets – a market which I professionally made a transition to after the 2008 crisis from the financial markets, simply because I believed it was a market that would still function according to true fundamentals…

I guess that only lasted so long…

The commodity markets have been prone to excessive speculation for years, but at the end, the thought of specializing in something “tangible” that EVENTUALLY would have to revert back to true supply and demand fundamentals made all the sense in the world. Specially with the true circus that the financial markets have become since 2008…

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From: XXXXXXXXXX

To: "Peter"

Sent: Wednesday, April 20, 2016 1:35 PM

Subject: volume totals today

774K of soybeans traded today and that would be a record by nearly 160K contracts as yesterday set the record at 615K.

Over 88K Jly/Nov traded today and 97K May/Jly traded. Unheard of non-roll numbers.

Meal volume was 270K and we have to think that was a record as well but not 100% on that one.

Lots of ideas around to try and explain the move: from commercial short hedgers blowing out, Chinese pricing, product switching from Argentina to the US.

Not really sure if all or any of this is true but it was quite a wild session

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From: "Peter"

Sent: Wednesday, April 20, 2016 2:41 PM

To: XXXXXXXXXX

Subject: RE: Some staggering volume totals today

Man… I would be VERY surprised if this was due to any of the reasons people are mentioning…

Chinese pricing – I am very positive it does have something to do with it, but for the overnight session – not the daytime.

Commercial hedgers blowing out – very possibly adding to the mess – but no way commercial volume takes us to these levels of ridiculousness in total volume…

Product switching from ARG – yep, because we REALLY need to ration our 400+ mb bean stocks… LOL

This is way past insane, ridiculous, etc…

The “fundamental” reasons people are trying to ping to this are simply a nice “window dressing”…

There is nothing else that can explain this other than you know what?

Here comes my Very-REAL Conspiracy Theory: the stupid FED and other Central Bankers around the world acting in unison to artificially raise inflation so that they can hopefully get out of the F’ing mess they got themselves into with this low/negative rate BS. Call me crazy, and I am not a “conspiracy theorist” – but what is happening has absolutely no “reasonable” explanation. So I have to think outside the box…

The FED and other Central Banks have already destroyed the equity and other macro-financial markets… it is now turn for the commodities markets…

I am serious … I really am… I wish I was just being sarcastic… but pause for a moment and think about what is written above…

What explains the move in Crude? Ok, I could try and put some sort of “rationality” on the initial move from $26 - $40 (as crazy as it was), but the action in the oil market since Sunday’s “about face” in Doha? No way anything other than pure, simple and outright manipulation can explain these last 3 days of action in the crude oil market… nothing…

How about the fact that the main drag on the inflation figures has been what? What? FOOD & ENERGY…

So is it so crazy to think that Central Bankers all got together in early 2016 and came up with the following equation???

ARTIFICIALLY RAISE COMMODITY VALUATIONS = HIGHER ARTIFICIAL INFLATION = CLAMORING FOR RATES TO BE RAISED = CENTRAL BANKS HAVING A “SUCCESSFUL” END TO THE CLUSTERFCK THEY GOT THEMSELVES AND THE REST OF ALL OF US INTO WITH THEIR “ZIRP” AND “NIRP” EXPERIMENTS…

Who or what has the power to produce such volume in such short amount of time?????? Not the powerful Chinese, not the commercials, not even the “regular” hedge fund crowd… This is much bigger than that Chris… much bigger…

When you pause and think about what I just wrote – it will not sound that crazy after all…

I truly wish I was joking…

I also wish I could let go of my natural makeup of focusing on “fundamentals” and just go long everything… but I don’t believe I can… and I am frankly and idiot for it…

Don’t write this off as some crazy conspiracy… Think about it… it is almost scary how much sense it makes…

At the end of the day… it is what it is…

Peter

- Incident related to rollercoaster crash in June 2015

- Two people had their legs amputated while three others suffered life threatening injuries; total 16 people injured

- In court, the company was alleged to have breached section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974

- The firm will face an unlimited fine when it is sentenced at a later date. One senior legal source said the penalty would run "into the millions", depending on mitigation.

- Sales in USA and Europe are stable

- China sales should not be a huge disappointment 

- Global Steel overcapacity is dangerous for even the best companies

- Talks need to be held with China