Poland

• Why did Yellen use criminals in her employment case studies? Hilsenrath explainz (Hilsenrath)
• GM avoided defective switch redesign in 2005 to save a dollar each (Reuters)
• Xuzhou Zhongsen Said to Avert Bond Default on Guarantor Aid  (BBG)
• France's New Finance Minister Faces Fiscal Challenge (WSJ)
• The magic is gone: Draghi’s Attempt to Talk Down Euro Lost on Traders (BBG)
• Another John Kerry smashing success: U.S. Gambit on Mideast Peace Talks Falters (WSJ)
• Combat-Ready China Military Seen as Xi’s Goal in Graft Battle (BBG)
• Huge earthquake off Chile's north coast triggers tsunami (Reuters)
• Pressure rises on Gross as investors pull $3.1 billion from Pimco's flagship fund (Reuters)

No tree grows to the sky. Once extremes are reached, trends reverse, often with symmetry: the decline often matches the ascent. Which leads to an interesting question: have we reached Peak Putin? The capture of a few pawns has cleared the chessboard, but the strategic choices already made have greatly reduced Putin's room to maneuver.

Does Obama realize that he is leading the US and its puppet states to war with Russia and China, or is Obama being manipulated into this disaster by his neoconservative speech writers and government officials? World War 1 (and World War 2) was the result of the ambitions and mistakes of a very small number of people. We are again on the road to World War. One hundred years ago the creation of a world war by a few had to be done under the cover of deception. Germany had to be caught off guard. The British had to be manipulated and, of course, people in all the countries involved had to be propagandized and brainwashed. Today the drive to war is blatantly obvious. The lies are obvious, and the entire West is participating, both media and governments.

U.S. stocks are like a duck, floating on a quiet pond – calm above the surface, but lots of furious churning invisible to the naked eye.  The S&P 500 looks like it will end the first quarter within a hair of the 1848 level where it started the year, but that doesn’t mean everything else is all stasis and light.  Today we offer up a quick ‘Top 10’ list of surprises from the last 90 days.  Gold, for example, is back from the grave, up 7.3%.  So is an imperial Russia, with the biggest land grab since the building of the Berlin Wall.  Mutual fund flows are ahead of exchange traded funds by a factor of 5:1.  And most of those ETF inflows are into bond funds, not the “Great Rotation” we all expected into stocks.  The 10-year U.S. Treasury yields all of 2.67%, and bonds have bested U.S. stocks consistently in 2014.  First quarter 2014 may not have been a long trip, but it certainly has been strange.

President Obama denounced Russia's "brute force" in Ukraine during a speech in Brussels today, but it seems from the images and clips below that Russia cares little for words and is more about strategic actions for now. Russia now, reportedly, controls 51 Ukraine Navy ships and while Merkel is talking tough, she is careful not to be too aggressive in her call for escalation. After some de-escalation after the referendum, NATO (and increasingly social media) confirm that things are re-escalating as Russia tanks were being moved en masse across the nation to various borders.

The Diplomat‘s Justin McDonnell spoke with Larisa Smirnova, an expert on Sino-Russian relations and professor at Xiamen University, about the crisis in Ukraine, Russian foreign policy, and more.

It seems the words of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warning that “the world stands on the brink of conflict, the consequences of which are not foreseen... Not everyone in Europe is aware of this situation," are a little more real than some (US equity buyers) might suspect. As The Week's Crispin Black reports, at least 7,000 Polish workers in Europe have received call-up papers as army reservists in the last few weeks. Polish authorities dismiss it as "routine" but the men note this has never happened before.

While Naftogaz (Ukraine's gas pipeline operator) states that all gas transportation from Russia to Europe is running normally, Bloomberg reports that Russian natgas exports to Europe are declining. Shipments are down over 4% from the prior week and also lower to Ukraine. This 'adjustment' follows increased sanctions by the West as Medvedev's notable statement this morning that Ukraine owes Russia $16bn. Furthermore, Gazprom has cut its Diesel output by the most in 7 months... and just to rub some Black Sea salt into the wound, NY Times reports that Russia's asking price for natgas to Europe is soaring.

It has been a while since well-known Russian nationalist and spotlight-grabbing politician, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, made headlines. The recent flame up of Cold War 2.0 is precisely the cover the flamboyant individual needed to reemerge once more, scandalous as ever. Because while the west scrambles to find a way to punish Russia for openly flaunting its relentless hollow threats by annexing Crimea, Zhirinovsky is back and has a "modest proposal" for Ukraine, and the countries neighboring the troubled former USSR territory: namely dividing the country along the lines of an infamous Nazi-Soviet pact, suggesting that regions in Western Ukraine hold referendums on breaking away from Kiev. In a letter sent to the governments of Poland, Romania and Hungary, Vladimir Zhirinovsky also suggested those countries hold referendums on incorporating the regions into their territory. The question is whether Zhirinovsky, who traditionally has been just a bit of a loose cannon yet whose nationalist Liberal Democratic party largely backs President Vladimir Putin in the Russian parliament,speaks only for himself, or whether Putin is using him the way the Fed uses Hilsenrath.

Since the early twentieth century, Saudi Arabia has enjoyed a close relationship with the United States. From the development of the Saudi oil fields,to the First Gulf War, this relationship has been an uneasy cooperation—each side received something out of the alliance while nervously watching the other.  So recently we have the first open break between the two powers culminating in the Saudi’s refusing a seat on the U.N Security Council due to anger with U.S. Middle Eastern policies. It is foolish for America to offend and promote distrust with another ally in a long list of broken long-standing relationships.  These include Poland, United Kingdom, Israel, Egypt, etc.  One wonders whether the results of American diplomacy  stems from extreme incompetence or is evidence of a much darker agenda.

Concurrently with out post on what the odds are of a war between the US and Russia over Ukraine, the House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, and war hawk, appeared on TV this morning saying that the United States ought to provide weapons to the Ukrainian army "so it could defend the country from a Russian invasion." This is the same Mike Rogers who last August did everything in his power to perpetuate the lie that Syrians had used chemical weapons against "rebels" (who subsequently turned out to be mostly Qatari-funded Al Qaeda mercenaries and other Islamic extremists) “There are things that we can do that I think we’re not doing. I don’t think the rhetoric (from Obama administration officials) matches the reality on the ground,” he said. And while US neocons are warmongering, Ukraine is all too happy to raise the tension level just a bit more, hoping that NATO will finally intervene and present Putin with at least some hurdle to overrunning all of East Ukraine, using exactly the same template as already show in Crimea: Ukraine’s top diplomat warned Sunday that the chances of war with Russia “are growing” due to the buildup of Moscow’s forces along his country’s eastern border. In an interview with ABC’s “This Week,” acting Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Deshchytsia said Kiev “is ready to respond” should Russia–which has already seized the Crimea–move further in Ukrainian territory.

Vice President Biden was in Warsaw last week to reassure our eastern NATO allies that they have the support of a “steadfast ally.” But if Russia moved against Poland or the Baltic States, would the United States really go to war? Or would we do nothing and effectively destroy the NATO alliance? President Obama has ruled out a “military excursion” in Ukraine. America is not obligated legally to take action against Russia for annexing Crimea. We would not go to war if Russia mounted a large-scale invasion of Ukraine to restore the ousted, pro-Moscow government of Viktor Yanukovych, currently under U.S. sanctions. And we would not even send troops if Ukraine was partitioned, or absorbed by Russia. Americans have no interest in such a conflict, and no stomach for it.

The situation with Russia should give investors and traders a reason to brush up on their history, as current events take root in things that happened 50, 100, and 200 years ago.  To understand this, can provide perspective, during an information war, where it's not easy for some to separate facts from beliefs and propoganda (on both sides).  The relationship between US and Russia has always been interesting, as we shall explore.

The cultural divide

While it has been public for a long time that i) JPM is eager to sell its physical commodities business and ii) the most likely buyer was little known Swiss-based Mercuria, there was nothing definitive released by JPM. Until moments ago, when Jamie Dimon formally announced that JPM is officially parting ways with the physical commodities business. But while contrary to previous expectations, following the sale JPM will still provide commercial gold vaulting operations around the world, it almost certainly means farewell to Blythe Masters.

And there it is:

RUSSIA, CRIMEA, SEVASTOPOL SIGN AGREEMENT ON ENTERING ACCESSION
REPUBLIC OF CRIMEA CONSIDERED PART OF RUSSIA FROM DATE OF SIGNING AGREEMENT - KREMLIN

And futures, stocks, and risk in general is soaring, sending the Kremlin precisely the message it needs to know that there is absolutely nothing wrong with this. Perhaps if Russia had annexed all of Ukraine, or the Baltics, or maybe even Poland, the S&P would have soared over 2000 already?