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Before markets could finish shrugging off their losses from overnight, another wave of troubling trade news has arrived to sour the trading mood.

Not only is Washington weighing whether to impose restrictions on Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology – a CCTV company that’s the largest supplier of video surveillance equipment for Beijing’s indomitable security apparatus – as was reported last night, but four other Chinese firms might also find their way onto the “Entities List,” Washington’s blacklist. Like Huawei(which has been put on a temporary hold), the restrictions being considered would cut off the flow of critical American components to as many as five companies.

The only other firm named by Bloomberg was Zhejiang Dahua Technology, another supplier for the Chinese security state, along with “several unidentified others.” All the firms are said to be security-focused.

Shares of both companies led Chinese markets lower on Wednesday, wiping billions of dollars of wealth for the tycoons behind both companies.

Any action taken against these two companies would constitute the first actions to cripple China’s security apparatus, which has drawn international condemnation over the imprisonment of 1 million ethnic Uyghurs in the far-West Xinjiang province. Both companies have been accused of facilitating Beijing’s repressive activities, according to human rights groups, and Hikvision, the industry leader in Chinese security, has begun selling its cameras abroad. These cameras are capable of using facial recognition technology on a vast scale.

Reports about Washington’s plans, rattled Chinese stocks in afternoon trading, with the small-cap ChiNext gauge recording the biggest drop (1.1%), while the Shanghai Composite also skidded (0.7%). The Japanese yen strengthened against most G-10 rivals.

For an idea of how Beijing would react to more bans, remember: Blacklisting one company prompted President Xi to herald the beginning of a “new Long March”. A trade war “fight song” has gone viral across China. Another escalation from the US would only help cement the widely held notion that Trump is deliberately trying to ‘contain’ China, unleashing another wave of fervent trade-war nationalism.

It’s still unclear whether more companies will join Huawei on the “Entities List”, which blocks the sale of American technology to a given firm without special permission. Washington has rooted its attacks on Huawei as a matter of ‘national security’, as Washington fears most of these firms would assist Beijing in global espionage.

In response to the reports, Global Times editor Hu Xijin warned that China would adapt to more hostility to the US.

The US won’t be able to press China to submit, however it will force China to re-prioritize economic development. China has been focusing on improving social justice and fairness for some time. Now to hit back at the US, China will see another upsurge of overall development boom.

— Hu Xijin 胡锡进 (@HuXijin_GT) May 22, 2019

We imagine we’ll be hearing more from Beijing soon.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2EAvlEP Tyler Durden

Authored by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,

Next week, Europeans may be able to gauge how high the tide of populism and nationalism has risen within their countries and on their continent.

For all the returns will be in from three days of elections in the 28 nations represented in the European Parliament.

Expectation: Nationalists and populists will turn in their strongest performance since the EU was established, and their parliamentary group — Europe of Nations and Freedom — could sweep a fourth of the seats in Strasbourg.

Nigel Farage’s new Brexit Party is predicted to run first in the British elections, winning two to three times the votes of the ruling Tory Party of Prime Minister Theresa May.

In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally is running even with the party of President Emmanuel Macron, who pleads for “more Europe.”

Matteo Salvini, interior minister and leader of the League, predicts his party will finish first in Italy and first in Europe.

At Salvini’s invitation, a dozen nationalist parties gathered in Milan this weekend. A week from now, they could be the third-largest bloc in the European Parliament. If so, their gains will come at the expense of the center-left and center-right parties that have dominated European politics since World War II.

Speaking before tens of thousands in front of Duomo Cathedral in Milan, Salvini threw back in the faces of his enemies the taunt that these new parties are rooted in the old ugly politics of the 1930s.

“In this piazza, there are no extremists. There are no racists. There are no fascists. … In Italy and in Europe, the difference is between … those who speak of the future instead of making trials of the past.”

Tomorrow versus yesterday, says Salvini.

While the European establishment draws parallels between the populist parties of the present and what happened in the 1930s, it fails to recognize its own indispensable role in generating the mass defections to the populist right that now imperil its political hegemony.

The populist-nationalist parties are energized and united by both what they detest and what the EU has produced.

And what is that?

They resent the inequities of the new economy, where the wages of the working and middle class, the core of the nation, have fallen far behind the managerial class and the corporate and financial elites.

People who work with their hands, tools and machines have seen their wages arrested and jobs disappear, as salaries have surged for those who move numbers on computers.

The disparities have grown too great, as has the distance between national capitals and national heartlands.

Then there is immigration. Native-born Europeans do not welcome the new ethnic groups that have come uninvited in considerable numbers in recent decades, failed to assimilate and created enclaves that replicate the Third World places whence they came.

If one could identify a cry common to populists, it might be: “We want our country back!”

Whatever may be said of populists and nationalists, they are people of the heart. They love their countries. They cherish the cultures in which they grew up. They want to retain their own unique national identities.

What is wrong with that?

Patriotism is central to nationalist and populist movements. Globalism is alien to them. They believe in De Gaulle’s Europe of nation-states “from the Atlantic to the Urals,” not in the abstract Europe of Jean Monnet, and surely not in the Brussels bureaucracy of today.

The nation, the patria, is the largest entity to which one can give loyalty and love. Who would march into no man’s land for the EU?

Europe’s nationalists are not all the same. The ruling Polish Law and Justice Party disagrees on Putin’s Russia with the ruling Fidesz Party of Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Hungary.

While the EU Parliament does not possess great power, these elections are not without great meaning.

Consider Farage. Should his Brexit Party run first in Britain, how can the Tory Party not carry through on the 2016 vote to withdraw from the EU, without betraying its most loyal constituency on its most critical issue?

Nationalism in Europe is spreading, even deepening rifts between the premier powers in the NATO alliance.

Germany will not be reaching the promised 2 percent of GDP for defense President Donald Trump has demanded. And Berlin is going ahead with a second natural gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea to Germany from Russia, Nord Stream 2.

Turkey is taking possession of a Russian-built S-400 air defense system this summer, despite a U.S. warning that our sale of 100 F-35s will not go through if the Turks go forward with the Russian system.

Have the nationalists of Europe caught the wave of the future?

Or will the future see the revival of the idea of One Europe, a political and economic union that inspired the dreamers of yesteryear?

From here it looks like Matteo, not Macron.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2JwtULz Tyler Durden

New details have emerged about the recently revealed dossier(s) Monsanto, now owned by Bayer, compiled to sway public opinion on herbicides. The dossier(s) included people from 7 European states and potentially beyond, according to a new report by RT. 

Monsanto files reportedly listed prominent public figures who were opinionated on either side of the herbicide debate. The list included “stakeholders in France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom, as well as regarding stakeholders related to EU institutions.” 

Bayer says it has hired a law firm for the purpose of trying to determine whether similar lists exist in other states. 

Recall, about one week ago we reported that Bayer, which is being investigated by French prosecutors for compiling files of influential people such as journalists in France, likely did the same across Europe, suggesting a potentially wider problem.

French prosecutors said several weeks ago that they had opened an inquiry after newspaper Le Monde filed a complaint alleging that Monsanto – acquired by Bayer for $63 billion last year – had kept a file of 200 names, including journalists and lawmakers in hopes of influencing positions on pesticides. The list was said to be prepared by PR firm FleishmanHillard on behalf of Monsanto. 

“[We have] decided with the agency to end the collaboration in the areas of communication and public affairs for the time being,”  Bayer said, referring to PR firm FleishmanHillard.

Bayer acknowledged the existence of the files and said it does not believe any laws were broken.

“It’s safe to say that other countries in Europe were affected by lists … I assume that all EU member states could potentially be affected,” Matthias Berninger, Bayer’s head of public affairs and sustainability, told journalists about a week ago.

“When you collect non-publicly available data about individuals a Rubicon is clearly crossed,” regardless of whether data privacy laws were actually violated, he added.

Bayer said in its initial statement that it had “…no indication that the preparation of the lists under discussion violated any legal provisions.”

The issue of the lists pales in comparison to the legal liability Bayer potentially faces after losing its third trial in a row over claims that its Roundup weed killer causes cancer. A jury recently awarded a total of $2 billion in punitive damages to a husband and wife over their Roundup-related cancer claims. 

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2VRFZRY Tyler Durden

Via Middle East Eye,

France has threatened three French journalists with potential jail time for using secret documents to reveal the country’s involvement in the Yemen civil war. 

In a series of reports published in April, investigative journalists from Disclose and Radio France revealed the number of French arms sold to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. 

The documents, authored by France’s Directorate of Military Intelligence (DSGI), showed that senior French officials had lied about the role of French weapons in the Yemen War. 

Following the publication of the reports in April, Disclose’s co-founders Geoffrey Livolsi and Mathias Destal and Radio France journalist Benoît Collombat were asked to attend a hearing at the DSGI headquarters in Paris. 

The three journalists refused to reveal their sources after being questioned by the DSGI on the origin of the document, their work and posts on Facebook and Twitter.

The journalists used the hearing to defend press freedom and how it was in the public interest to publish details from the leaked DSGI document. 

Press Freedom has been protected for more than 130 years under the Press Law of 1881, which gives journalists the right to keep sources confidential. 

But the law, however, does not cover national security and the journalists could be sentenced under a 2009 French law that considers as an offence the handling of a classified document without clearance or proper authorisation.

If convicted, the journalists could face five years in prison and a $83,000 fine. The case could be closed by the DSGI or be handed to a judge who could take the case to trial. 

France is ranked 32nd out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2019 World Press Freedom Index.

Paul Coppin, the head of Reporters Without Border’s (RSF) legal unit, criticised the DSGI for attempting to prosecute the French journalists. 

In a statement published on the RSF website, Coppin described the case as a “matter of legitimate public interest”.

“We are concerned that the sole aim of this hearing is to use the threat of prosecution to put pressure on these journalists to reveal their source,” said Paul Coppin.

“As it is legally unable to force them to disclose the identity of their source, the prosecutor’s office is using the possibility of a charge of compromising national defence secrecy, a charge punishable by five years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros [$83,750].

“The mere fact of threatening such a prosecution for publishing information in the public interest would in itself constitute a serious violation of the public’s right to be informed.”

Yemen’s civil war has killed or injured more than 17,900 civilians and triggered a famine that has taken the lives of an estimated 85,000 children.

Campaigners have argued that arms supplied by other Western countries, including the United States and Britain, have been used by the Saudi-led coalition to commit human rights abuses as they fight against Iran-backed Houthi rebels.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2Wlf3cP Tyler Durden

A 31-year-old social worker in the UK is set to inherit a £50m ($64 million US) estate in Cornwall, UK, after a DNA test revealed he was the son of its deceased owner, reports The Guardian. 

Jordan Adlard Rogers discovered that his father was Charles Rogers following the aristocrat’s 2018 demise. The elder Rogers was found dead in his car last August of a methadone overdose at the age of 62, after spending 40 years living as a “drug-addled recluse.”

Estate manager Mr Care was the last person to speak to Charles, around three days before his body was discovered.

Mr Care said that in the months leading up to his death, Charles was malnourished and neglecting his personal hygiene, rarely changing his clothes.

Instead of living in his lavish home, Charles was sleeping in his car. –CornwallLive

Jordan, meanwhile, has moved his girlfriend and newborn son out of government housing onto the 1,536-acre Penrose estate, which his family has lived in since 1771. He will receive an annual stipend of £52,000 ($66,000 US) from the Rogers family trust. Of note, the average salary of a community support worker is £20,536 ($26,000 US) per year.

Jordan, formerly a family support worker, had suspected that Charles Rogers was his father since the age of eight. 

“He offered to do a DNA test when I was younger but it didn’t happen and then when I was 18 I knocked on his door and asked if I could have the test and he told me to do it through the solicitors. I was 18 so had other priorities at the time,” said Jordan. 

“I wrote more letters in my twenties but never got a reply, then three years ago I got in contact with power of attorney Philip Care. Philip said Charles didn’t want to do the test so I wrote one final letter with a DNA test kit enclosed and that was when Philip rang and told me Charles was dead.” 

“I’m not going to forget where I’ve come from,” he told CornwallLive. “I’ve been at the point of worrying about the next bill and have had a tough start in life but now I’m here I want to help people.” 

“I’m now starting to get my feet under the table here. People say I’m lucky but I would trade anything to be able to go back and for Charles to know I was his son. Maybe then he might have taken a different path,” Jordan added. 

“I don’t need to work anymore so want to set up a charity and help the Porthleven and Helston communities.”

The estate generates income from investments in stocks, as well as the rental of a number of parcels of land to local farmers. 

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2Jzd0vE Tyler Durden

Authored by Bill Wirtz via The American Conservative,

The French president is gathering unlikely allies to challenge the populists. But he’s so unpopular, it might not even matter.

It’s rare that the likes of Emmanuel Macron is compared to Roger Stone. But Stone’s cardinal rule, “In order to win, you must do everything,” very much applies to the French president. And the latest political alliance he’s struck ahead of the upcoming European elections only reinforces that.

Macron’s La République En Marche (“the Republic on the move”) party presented its European election manifesto in Paris two weeks ago, then traveled to Berlin and other European capitals to rally French expat voters. It also promoted its ally parties from other countries, namely the German Free Democratic Party (FDP), the Spanish center-right Ciudadanos, the Dutch D66, the Hungarian Momentum, the Belgian liberal MR, the Austrian liberal NEOS, and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s VVD. Through this group—which is humbly called “Renaissance”—Macron is trying to win 100 seats in the European Parliament (out of 778). But getting there will be tough, because even the aforementioned parties that actively wield power haven’t won significant shares of the vote.

This is where the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), a transnational political grouping, comes in. 

Macron’s plan is to adopt the platform of the ALDE, drop the word “liberal” (which in Europe still refers to economic liberalism), and use its resources to argue for a stronger EU. But the ALDE itself has struggled to establish a power base and forged some shady alliances in trying to do so. For instance, it currently includes the Czech party ANO, whose leader, Andrej Babiš, is being investigated for allegedly misallocating €2 million ($2.24 million) for an infrastructure project he himself owned, in what is currently one of his country’s biggest corruption scandals. Babiš was a member of the communist party in the 1980s. He is on the European Court of Human Rights’ list of the former Czechoslovak dictatorship’s secret agents. He created a business empire in the post-Soviet 1990s, and now owns a very significant part of the Czech Republic’s media landscape.

And he isn’t the only media mogul on the list of Macron’s likely allies. Delyan Peevski from the ALDE affiliate Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) was identified by Reporters Without Borders as one of the main reasons for the poor state of the media in Bulgaria. RWB points out that the “New Bulgarian Media Group” controls nearly 80 percent of print media distribution in that country, and that it covers up corruption scandals by intimidating those trying to investigate shady business deals.

In Estonia, ALDE-affiliated Prime Minister Jüri Ratas didn’t mind forming a government coalition with the far-right EKRE party. Estonian Minister of Finance Martin Helme, a member of the EKRE, has been quoted saying “If you’re black, go back,” and calling for a “white Estonia.” His father, Mart Helme, who is now minister of interior, complained that the “number of negroes in Tallinn [Estonia’s capital] has grown explosively” and said of LGBT events that he does not see why “the police should guard a parade of perverts.”

To warn of a “wave of dangerous populists in Europe” while simultaneously getting in bed with them to stay in power shows quite a level of political opportunism. Not that being called a populist worries this group too much. In 2017, ALDE leader and former Belgian prime minister Guy Verhofstadt held talks with the populist Italian Five Star Movement, which is currently part of the Italian government. Verhofstadt was hoping to bring them onboard, which would have made the ALDE the third biggest group in the Parliament—even though he himself had said two years earlier that “it is impossible for any responsible, pro-European group to take the M5S [the Five Star Movement] on board” in a post that he has since deleted. Call it a European flip-flop.

Now that the Italian nationalists have opted out of a “centrist” alliance, Macron’s Renaissance is attempting to recruit the Italian Social Democrats. The ALDE says it’s looking for a “green, left, and centrist” coalition. I think they’re running the risk of repeating themselves.

What does Macron actually want?

Renaissance’s manifesto makes mention of much of what he’s already argued for in his European reform plans. But that was back when he was still giving off an exciting vibe in the distant year of 2017. People don’t get fired up by a European minimum wage and a European army anymore. Particularly in Central and Eastern Europe, centralized minimum wage laws can be seen as a way to crush emerging industries in favor of Western European production. And Macron’s proposed “agency to protect European democracies” would likely be viewed as taking aim at the governments of Poland, Hungary, and Romania.

But Macron’s struggles ultimately start at home. His pick for lead candidate in the European elections, Nathalie Loiseau, is a diplomat and academic administrator. Utterly devoid of excitement, she used a recent speech to give voice to the standard “dangers” of Donald Trump’s politics and liken her political project to the spirit of Gutenberg and Picasso. The address was probably supposed to fit with the “Renaissance” theme. That a considerable part of the country was still putting on yellow traffic vests and screaming their lungs out against the government in Paris doesn’t seem to bother her. They’re probably all populists anyway.

Marine Le Pen doesn’t need to do much ahead of the elections. She leads Macron’s movement by half a point, which would have been considered unfathomable just a year ago. And the more Le Pen gathers steam, the more Macron will lose ground.

Not that we should have expected more from one of the most unpopular presidents in French history.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/30C3cpV Tyler Durden