Italy

Every great con game eventually comes to an end. 

Earlier today, Barack Obama, together with 6 of the world's most powerful leaders (but certainly not Vladimir Putin) congregated in the Bavarian town of Krun where they will for the next two days hunker down at the luxurious Scholss Elmau for the latest G-7 meeting, covering an agenda dealing with climate change, global extremism, and of course, solving the Ukraine crisis (with or without instructions from George Soros on how to proceed). Serious stuff. Obama, however, decided to keep it "folksy" and the lame duck president, content with the direction the world is going, pulled a page right out of National Lampoons European vacation and kicked it back.

After yesterday's unprecedented volatility fireworks across all markets and continents, today so far has been a modest disappointment, with no crashes and subsequent surges in China, where the Politburo's only achievement was keeping the bubble dream alive by pushing the Shanghai Composite over 5,000 for the first time since January 2008, closing the index 1.5% higher on the day - a very modest gain by China's recent blow-off top standards.  Europe, too, has been relatively tame with the 10 Year Bund starting off on the wrong foot, the yield rising back above 0.91% before once again dipping to the upper 0.8% range, tracking the move in the EURUSD tick for tick, which also is a tractor beam for the US 10 Year. On the equity, front, things are just as muted, with futures at the Low of Day as of this moment, despite yesterday's last minute manic buying spree, the S&P set to open below 2100 as a result.

While hope has long been dismissed as a strategy among the investing public, for game-theory expert (and Greek FinMin) Yanis Varoufakis, "hope" appears to be all he has left. Reflecting on James Byrnes 1946 speech, Varoufakis explains a “Speech of Hope” for Greece would make all the difference now – not only for us, but also for our creditors, as our renaissance would terminate the default risk.

For once Mario Draghi was right. A day after the European central bank head warned of a spike in volatility, volatility did just that, with markets everywhere from China to Europe seeing volatility explode.

Most commentary still appears predicated on the idea that there will be some last-minute deal - either because the creditors will back down and give Greece some more money without requiring it to be paid back or because the Greek government will back down if it understands that not doing so would ultimately mean leaving the euro. On the other hand, some believe neither side is particularly interested in achieving a deal.

The European Commission has ordered 11 EU countries to enact the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD) within two months or be hauled before the EU Court of Justice, according to a report from Reuters on Friday.

With the Greek IMF payment just 48 hours away, and Europe having submitted its best and final offer to Greece in a battle of "deal proposals", today Greek PM Tsipras will meet with European Commission President Juncker to discuss the recently submitted reform proposals by the Greek premier. However, a Greek government spokesman says that Greek PM Tsipras will not meet Eurogroup's Dijsselbloem despite several reports suggesting that they would do so later today. Last night it was reported that the EU, ECB, IMF agreed on terms for a cash-for-reform plan to be presented to Greece. However, a senior EU official has said that they are concerned that the stringent measures of the proposal could be met with rejection by Greece.

Ever wondered what life would be like if a country actually disappeared off the face of the planet or at least transformed into something else?

 Most large financial entities are insolvent. As a result, if a significant amount of digital money is converted into actual physical cash, the firm would very quickly implode.

Greece has received what The New York Times recently described as “dueling sales pitches” on two proposed natural gas pipelines, with the US pressing Athens to support The Southern Gas Corridor rather than Gazprom's Turkish Stream project. It appears Moscow may have made the more convincing case because, much to Washington's dismay, Greece is set to sign an MOU for the Greek portion of The Turkish Stream pipeline in June.

A recent poll suggests that 58% of Syriza supporters would rather return to the Drachma than to remain in the single currency while severe austerity measures are imposed. Syriza have a 26 point lead over the next most popular party, New Democracy.

Once again it's all about Greece, with the latest iteration of a "Greek deal is imminent" rumor making the rounds and, just like yesterday, sending futures in the green, just a little over an hour after the increasingly more illiquid E-mini future has slid 0.7%. The EUR, where the bulk of Virtu headline kneejerk reacting algos are to be found, has surged over 100 pips overnight on more hope and optimism.

June is off with a bang, and a very busy week in the macro economic calendar, both globally and in the US, which culminates with the latest "most important ever" payrolls report, one which will surely be closely watched by a Fed which may hike as soon as a few weeks from now (but probably won't).

Remember China's 6% crash last week? It is now a distant memory made even more remote thanks to the latest batch of ugly data out of China, coupled with hints of even more liquidity injections, which led to the latest surge in the Shcomp, an index that has put most pennystocks to shame. In Europe, the big story remains Greece, and as everyone expected, the doomed country and its creditors failed to make a deal on Sunday. This is after Greek Officials were said to have prepared a draft agreement, which was expected to be announced on Sunday. Not helping things, Greek PM Tsipras came out in fully defiant mode and accused bailout monitors of making “absurd” demands and seeking to impose “harsh punishment” on Athens. A bunch of final PMI number showed a modest improvement in the periphery at the expense of Germany whose deterioration is starting to be a concern.