Norway

A big catalyst for the ongoing collapse in the Bloomberg commodity index which just hit a fresh 16 year low, is the relentless surge in the dollar, with the DXY rising as high as 99.98 the highest since April, as a result of rising prospects for a December U.S. rake hike (odds are now at 70%, up from 36% a month ago) boosting currency differentials and flows into the USD, making commodities more expensive for buyers in other currencies.

• Security jitters drive European investors back to safe havens (Reuters)
• Global Anti-ISIS Alliance Begins to Emerge (WSJ)
• Merkel says cancelling soccer match was 'responsible' decision (Reuters)
• Paris attacker may have had accomplice on journey through Balkans (Reuters)
• Drop Assad demands if you want to unite against Islamic State: Russia to West (Reuters)
• Putin sets up commission to combat terrorism financing (Reuters)

"My guess is that we will have negative rates in Norway before there will be any talk of QE"...

In the latest from Europe's border battles, Austria has responded to Slovenia by building its own version of an anti-migrant fence while Sweden has began checking trains coming from Denmark and removing anyone without the proper papers. Saving Schengen truly is a "race against time."

“Normally, policemen are not allowed on the tarmac. Recently, they’re being asked to spend nights beneath jets.”

On a day full of Manufacturing/PMI surveys from around the globe, the numbers everyone was looking at came out of China, where first the official, NBS PMI data disappointed after missing Mfg PMI expectations (3rd month in a row of contraction), with the Non-mfg PMI sliding to the lowest since 2008, however this was promptly "corrected" after the other Caixin manufacturing PMI soared to 48.3 in October from 47.2 in September - the biggest monthly rise of 2015 - and far better than the median estimate of 47.6, once again leading to the usual questions about China's Schrodinger economy, first defined here, which is continues to expand and contract at the same time.

While redistributive social spending in the US is indeed different from many other countries, the overall magnitude is actually greater (both proportionally and in absolute terms) in the US than in almost all other countries measured. One can argue that the way that the wealth is redistributed through public policy in the US is "wrong" or "suboptimal." But, to argue that there is less redistribution as a result of public policy in the US than elsewhere is simply wrong.

Bernie Sanders supporters seem to be everywhere. 49% of Democrats now have a favorable view towards socialism. This is scary. And sad. No matter how it is wrapped, socialism is still the belief that we can raise people out of poverty by taking money out of the hands of those who have learned how to produce. And it has never worked. Socialism always fails because at some point people realize they don’t have to work as hard to get the same amount of stuff. It takes all the incentive away to really succeed.

"House prices have decoupled most from local incomes in Hong Kong, London, Paris, Singapore, New York and Tokyo. Buying a 60-square-meter apartment exceeds the budget of most people who work even in the highly-skilled service sector. Loose monetary policy has prevented a normalization of housing markets and encouraged local bubble risks to grow"

As tipped earlier this month, Deutsche Bank just turned in a Q3 loss of €6 billion as a raft of writedowns hit the bottom line. The bank also announced more details of "Strategy 2020", which include layoffs and a corporate rethink that will see Europe's largest bank exit a multitude of markets. 

Norway's $860 billion sovereign wealth fund (tasked with managing the country's vast oil wealth) just had its worst quarter in 4 years and its first back-to-back quarterly loss since 2009 after an array of EM bets went awry. Meanwhile, the government is set to start making withdraws from the fund as slumping crude prices have effectively reduced inflows to zero. 

Fearing the size of Mario Draghi's bazooka (so to speak), Sweden's Riksbank has just expanded QE by SEK65 billion, marking the fourth expansion in nine months and serving notice that the beggar-thy-neighbor, monetary madness gripping DM central banks isn't likely to dissipate anytime soon.

"The nightmare for the Riksbank board is maybe something like this: they are gathered in the south of Sweden, looking out over the Baltic Sea, when they see a giant wave of money coming in from the euro zone and try to fight it with a hose."

How governments all around the world resort to absurd marketing to finance largesse