Category: zerohedge

With “Goldman Guys” forming the core support pillar of Donald Trump’s economic and financial advisory team, it is easy to forget that Goldman is also the one bank whose alumni also dominate not only the Fed, but all other central banks, and as such its take on Fed prepared remarks is probably the most notable of all sellside analysts.

With that in mind, moments ago Goldman’s chief economist Jan Hatzius just summarized her prepared remarks as follows: “Fed Chair Yellen said the FOMC would review the stance of policy at its “upcoming meetings”; if data “continue to evolve in line” with its expectations, further tightening would be warranted. We see the remarks as offering relatively strong support for near-term policy action.”

He also notes that Yellen “indicated that if employment and inflation are “continuing to evolve in line with [the committee’s] expectations”, “a further adjustment of the federal funds rate would likely be appropriate”. We see these comments as expressing somewhat more support for near-term tightening than we had expected. We therefore have nudged up our subjective probability of a rate increase at the March FOMC meeting to 20% from 15% previously”

He also made the following two key points:

1. In prepared remarks for her first day of Congressional testimony, Fed Chair Yellen indicated that the FOMC would evaluate the economy’s progress at its “upcoming meetings”. She indicated that if employment and inflation are “continuing to evolve in line with [the committee’s] expectations”, “a further adjustment of the federal funds rate would likely be appropriate”. We see these comments as expressing somewhat more support for near-term tightening than we had expected. We therefore have nudged up our subjective probability of a rate increase at the March FOMC meeting to 20% from 15% previously. We left our subjective probabilities for the May and June meetings unchanged at 20% and 45% respectively; today’s adjustment therefore implies cumulative odds of 85% of at least one hike by June (up from 80%). For the committee to move as soon as the March meeting, we would likely need to see better-than-expected data in the coming weeks, starting with a firm CPI report tomorrow.

 

2. In her comments today, Chair Yellen described the stance of policy as “accommodative”, in contrast to her remarks in January in which she said policy was only “modestly accommodative”. The former phrasing suggests that the committee will have a stronger presumption to lift rates, in our view. Lastly, Yellen declined to put emphasis on the “room to run” message she stressed at times last year, despite the modest increase in the unemployment rate. Instead, her comments focused on cumulative progress in the labor market. She said that the unemployment rate is more than 5pp from its 2010 peak, and noted that the U6 measure of labor market utilization “also continued to improve over the last year”.

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One week ago, Deutsche Bank analysts warned that the global economic boom is about to end for one reason that has nothing to do with Trump, and everything to do with China’s relentless debt injections. As DB’s Oliver Harvey said, “attention has focused on President Trump, but developments on the other side of the world may prove more important. At the beginning of 2016, China embarked on its latest fiscal stimulus funded from local government land sales and a booming property market. The Chinese business cycle troughed shortly thereafter and has accelerated rapidly since.”

DB then showed a chart of leading indicators according to which following a blistering surge in credit creation by Beijing, the economy was on the verge of another slowdown: “That makes last week’s softer-than-expected official and Caixin PMIs a concern. Land sales, which have led ‘live’ indicators of Chinese growth such as railway freight volumes by around 6 months, have already tailed off significantly. “ 

As DB concluded, “If China starts to slow again, the current risk-friendly environment has a short sell-by-date, particularly given rising oil prices and our view that any Trump stimulus will take at least a few quarters to work its way into US growth.”

Yes… but not yet, because as China reported overnight, in January Beijing injected the greatest amount of aggregate monthly credit, between bank and shadow loans, i.e., Total Social Financing, on record, amounting to an all time high $540 billion.

While China injected Rmb 2,030 billion in new loans, slighlty below consensus estimates of 2,440bn – still the second highest number on record – it was the surge in TSF that stunned China watchers: in total, China added a record Rmb3,740 bn in aggregative financing last month, far greater than consensus expectations of Rmb3,000 bn, and more than double the December total of  Rmb1,626 bn. The implied month-on-month growth was 15.1% SA ann mom, up from 12.8% in December. (There was no issuance of local government bonds in January compared with Rmb102.3 bn of issuance in December according to WIND data.) According to the PBOC, TSF stock growth (not adjusting for local government bond issuance) was 12.8% yoy in January.

With loans coming below expectations, and total aggregate credit trouncing consensus, this means that in January, contrary to stated intentions to tighten and delever its shadow banking system, China unleashed the biggest shadow debt expansion on record, driven mostly by undiscounted bankers acceptances, as well as growth in both Trust and Entrusted Loans.

Some observations: although new loans at the beginning of the year tend to be seasonally high, in this January, the PBOC had been aggressive in keeping new RMB loans under check, on the back of inflationary pressures, rising leverage and solid activity growth. PBOC adopted a combination of measures including administrative intervention and market approaches such as raising the Open Market Operations rate. New RMB loans in January were, as a result, lower than market expectation, and its growth rate moderated slightly on sequential basis.

On the other hand, Total social financing surprised drastically on the, mainly due to the following reasons:

1. substitution effect – because there was no local government bond net issuance and new RMB loan extensions were strictly monitored by the PBOC, commercial banks shifted to alternative credit channels such as bank acceptance bills (+Rmb613 bn in January vs. +Rmb159 bn in December last year) and trust loans (Rmb318bn in January vs. Rmb164 bn in December);
2. lower real interest rates and better corporate profitability in 2016 compared with 2015, which raised credit demand.

More importantly, this surge in credit has also resulted in a major credit impulse not only in China, but also around the globe, resulting in the latest inflationary push higher, and also leading to better than expected economic data as the impact of China’s credit generosity entered the global economy. It also means that the inflection point envisioned by DB may not be here just yet.

In other monetary aggregate data, China reported that broad money growth accelerated slightly from December on a sequential basis. The drag from fiscal deposit change mostly dissipated (fiscal deposits increased by Rmb412.4 bn, lower than the increase in January 2016 and 2015). FX outflows have probably remained large in January, which would dampen M2 growth.

As Goldman notes, “January money and credit data highlights the difficulties facing the PBOC. It is increasingly difficult to control broad liquidity supply to the economy amid an increasingly sophisticated financial market.”

Curiously, according to Goldman this latest record credit push may be the last hurrah:

“we see rising pressures for the monetary authorities to raise funding costs, even though we expect the central bank will be likely to continue with its stringent window guidance. Stronger sequential broad credit (adjusted TSF stock) growth tends to be supportive of short-term activity growth. We see rising upside risks to our forecast of meaningfully weaker sequential growth in 1Q, although qualitatively speaking, 1Q sequential activity growth is still likely to be weaker than it was in late 2016.”

Finally, the latest confirmation that Deutsche Bank may indeed be right following the record January credit expansion, comes from Moodys, which wrote that “a combination of tighter liquidity and stricter regulatory scrutiny on commercial lenders’ off-balance sheet activities will dampen fast-growing shadow banking activity in China, Broad shadow banking assets, including entrusted loans, financing through trust companies, undiscounted bankers’ acceptances, and wealth management products (WMPs) reached 58 trillion yuan ($8.42 trillion) in the first half of 2016, equivalent to 82% of gross domestic product, according to Moody’s. As Caixin redundantly adds, “the shadow banking business is still growing.” The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), the world’s largest bank by total assets, plans to issue additional WMPs worth 250 billion yuan in the first quarter of 2017, said employees of the state-owned lender. At the start of this year, ICBC managed 1.68 trillion yuan through WMPs.

While big banks are net fund suppliers in the interbank market, small and midsize banks, securities firms, and other financial institutions are net borrowers, the Moody’s report said. It pointed out that smaller banks rely heavily on wholesale funding, including aggressive issuance of certificates of deposit, and the purchase of WMPs in the interbank market as a way to boost profits amid declining net interest margins.

“Small and midsize banks are active investors in shadow banking products, including other banks’ WMPs, the trus and asset management plans of non-bank financial institutions,” the Moody’s report said. A growing reliance on wholesale funding exposes smaller banks to possible liquidity shocks caused by the withdrawal of funds by other financial institutions, especially when demand for cash increases at the end of the year or if default scandals occur, which in turn prompts the smaller banks to call back their own funds.

 

The growth of shadow banking may slow as regulation becomes more stringent, which mainly targets off-balance sheet WMPs, said Xu Jing, an assistant analyst with Moody’s Investor Service. In December, China’s central bank confirmed that it would include banks’ off-balance sheet WMP business in the Macro Prudential Assessment framework, a system to monitor commercial lenders’ credit exposure.

Following the record January expansion, China will have no choice but to take action if it hopes to have its “tightening” actions be taken seriously by the market and the global financial community.

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It is a long-running Fed tradition to quietly incorporate material warnings (deep within) about asset prices in the semi-annual Monetary Policy Report submitted as part of the Chair’s congressional testimony, and it did not disappoint this time either, when it made the following warning: “Nonfinancial corporate business leverage has remained elevated by historical standards even though outstanding riskier corporate debt declined slightly last year. In addition, valuation pressures in some asset classes increased, particularly late last year.“

And elaborated:

Nonfinancial corporate business leverage has remained elevated by historical standards, and household borrowing has increased modestly, leaving the household debt-to-income ratio about unchanged. On balance, the ratio of aggregate nonfinancial credit to gross domestic product (GDP) has moved up a little in recent years to about its level in the mid-2000s but remains well below its recent peak. Valuation pressures in some asset classes have been rising, particularly late last year.

 

Asset valuation pressures have increased, on balance, since mid-2016, along with several indicators of investors’ risk appetite. Although yields on Treasury securities and term premiums increased as market expectations about future growth shifted higher in the fall, they both remain low. In addition, the spread of yields on corporate bonds over those on comparablematurity Treasury securities narrowed. Estimates of risk premiums in equity markets also declined. Outstanding riskier corporate debt edged down over the past year, but gross issuance of leveraged loans was strong and the share of bond issuance rated B or below remained in the fourth quarter at the high end of its range over the past few years.

 

Commercial real estate (CRE) valuations, which have been an area of growing concern over the past year, rose further, with property prices continuing to climb and capitalization rates decreasing to historically low levels. While CRE debt remains modest relative to the overall size of the economy and the tightening in bank lending standards for CRE loans in the second half of last year may reflect some reduction in the appetite for CRE lending, the heightening of valuation pressures may leave some smaller banks vulnerable to a sizable CRE price decline. Also, residential home prices continued to rise briskly through November.

Of course, considering that we are now nearly two years, and 300 points higher, after Yellen’s May 2015 warning that “I would highlight that equity market valuations at this point generally are quite high,” adding that “there are potential dangers there”, expect the market to fully ignore today’s warning too.

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So who is this fucktard who thinks he has the right to lecture flyover America based on his street cred as a musician…

I decided to check out his guitar work…and I rest my case.

 

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Fed Chair Yellen will be appearing before Congress deliver her semi-annual monetary policy testimony (sometimes called the "Humphrey-Hawkins" testimony) today. Her prepared remarks are expected to sound similar to her most recent speech, noting that the labor market has tightened and wage pressures are increasing modestly.

As BofA details, she will likely note that the Fed is making progress toward its mandate of full employment and price stability with core inflation approaching the target.

However, we expect Yellen to reiterate that the Fed must proceed with a gradual hiking cycle, since rates are still close to the effective lower bound and that long-term rates are structurally lower.

 

In the Q&A session, we expect the focus to be on the debate over rules-based policy vs. discretion, the Fed's independence and proposed fiscal policy.

 

Yellen is likely to defend the Fed's independence and reiterate that fiscal stimulus is helpful, but that it depends on the design, especially given high debt levels.

"Our base case is Yellen will largely dance around the question but will nonetheless leave the door wide open to a wide range of possibilities because she can’t close any options off until the Committee has developed a plan," said Tom Porcelli, the chief US economist at RBC Capital Markets.

For now, the market is losing faith in the 'three hikes' forecast…

Before she spoke the ED curve implied the following probabilities…

And the question is whether Yellen can regain control over the Dollar having lost it apparently to Trump jawboning and China action…

Key headlines from a very hawkish Yellen speech:

• *FED SAYS ALREADY-CONCERNING CRE VALUATIONS ROSE FURTHER
• *YELLEN: FED TO ADJUST RATE PATH VIEWS AS OUTLOOK EVOLVES
• *YELLEN REPEATS WAITING TOO LONG TO TIGHTEN `WOULD BE UNWISE'
• *YELLEN: FURTHER ADJUSTMENT LIKELY NEEDED IF ECONOMY ON TRACK

Fed Chair Janet Yellen is due to speak at 10ET…

Full Prepared Remarks below:

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Donald Trump’s anticipated, if so far unofficial, reaction to the Flynn resignation hit moments ago when the president tweeted in response to the brewing scandal that “The real story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of Washington? Will these leaks be happening as I deal on N.Korea etc?”

The real story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of Washington? Will these leaks be happening as I deal on N.Korea etc?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 14, 2017

The White House announced Flynn’s resignation Monday night, the culmination of weeks of controversy surrounding alleged communications with Russia.  Flynn had initially denied speaking with Russia’s U.S. ambassador during the transition about sanctions levied by President Obama, but admitted this week that he may have done so and “inadvertently” told Vice President Mike Pence and others otherwise.

However, as we noted earlier, that will hardly placate Trump’s enemies who will demand to know how and if, indeed, the White House was warned by the DOJ of potential Russian ties for a month, and how long did Trump plan to keep Flynn on board.

Also, attention will focus on whether Flynn acting on his own when he discussed the Russian sanctions with the ambassador, and whether he was authorized to have the conversation, which will then shift the spotlight to Trump’s own allegations of close ties with the Kremlin.

Furthermore, Trump now faces backlash within the GOP as well, with John McCain saying moments ago that Gen. Flynn’s resignation “is a troubling indication of the dysfunction of the current national security apparatus.”

Finally, earlier on Tuesday, Wikileaks blamed a “destabilization campaign” by the media and Democrats for national security adviser Michael Flynn’s resignation.

Trump’s National Security Advisor Michael Flynn resigns after destabilization campaign by US spies, Democrats, press https://t.co/vKlX1Tqek1

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) February 14, 2017

“Trump’s National Security Advisor Michael Flynn resigns after destabilization campaign by US spies, Democrats, press,” the organization tweeted, including a screenshot of the press release from the White House announcing the President Trump accepted Flynn’s resignation.

As also reproted earlier, Russia responded to the Flynn resgination, calling it an “internal matter”, while some Russian politicans were quoted as accusing the US of “paranoia.”

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Traders in the fixed income and money markets are losing their religion. Slowly but surely, beginning at the long-end, record short speculative positioning in US bonds is being unwound as traders lose faith in Janet and Donald's double-whammy. But, for now, the very shortest Eurodollar speculators remain at record shorts… if Janet fails to convince them they're still right, a lot of leverage will be unwound…

On an aggregate basis, the record short bond futures positioning is being unwound…

 

And as Bloomberg notes, time is running out for fast-money short bets on eurodollar futures, with Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s congressional testimony starting Tuesday. The latest CFTC data suggest hedge funds and other speculators have been covering short bets in five-year Treasury futures, while maintaining near-record wagers that eurodollar rates will rise.

 

Should Yellen’s remarks fail to boost the market-implied probability of a steeper rates trajectory for 2017, starting with next month’s FOMC meeting, the resilience of fast-money eurodollar shorts may waver.

Simply put, Yellen has become a victim of her own success in convincing the market everything is awesome. The ED boat is as lop-sided as it has ever been.

And given the leverage driven off the back of these speculative 'dollar' positions, Trumphoria could well be disappointed.

And from what we can see, even the ED market is losing faith in three hikes…

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Submitted by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,

To those who lived through that era that tore us apart in the ’60s and ’70s, it is starting to look like “deja vu all over again.”

And as Adlai Stevenson, Bobby Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey did then, Democrats today like Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi are pandering to the hell-raisers, hoping to ride their energy to victory.

Democrats would do well to recall what happened the last time they rode the tiger of social revolution.

As the riots began in Harlem in 1964 and Watts in 1965, liberals rushed to render moral sanction and to identify with the rioters.

“In the great struggle to advance civil and human rights,” said Adlai at Colby College, “even a jail sentence is no longer a dishonor but a proud achievement. … Perhaps we are destined to see in this law-loving land people running for office … on their prison records.”

“There is no point in telling Negroes to obey the law,” said Bobby; to the Negro, “the law is the enemy.” Hubert assured us that if he had to live in a slum, “I could lead a mighty good revolt myself.”

Thus did liberals tie themselves and their party to what was coming. By 1967, Malcolm X had been assassinated, Stokely Carmichael with his call to “Black Power” had replaced John Lewis at SNCC, and H. Rap Brown had a new slogan: “By any means necessary.”

Came then the days-long riots of Newark and Detroit in 1967 where the 82nd Airborne was sent in. A hundred cities were burned and pillaged following the assassination of Dr. King on April 4, 1968.

And what happened in our politics?

The Democratic coalition of FDR was shattered. Gov. George Wallace rampaged through the Democratic primaries of Wisconsin, Indiana and Maryland in 1964, then ran third party and carried five Southern states in 1968.

His presidency broken by Vietnam and the riots, LBJ decided not to run again. Vice President Humphrey’s chances were ruined by the violent protests at his Chicago convention, which were broken up by the club-wielding cops of Democratic Mayor Richard J. Daley.

Race riots in the cities, student riots on campus, and that riot of radicals in Chicago helped deliver America to Richard Nixon.

Came then the huge anti-Nixon, anti-war demonstrations of the fall of 1969, the protests in the spring of 1970 after the Cambodian invasion and the Kent State killings, and the Mayday siege by thousands of anarchists to shut down D.C. in 1971.

Again and again, Nixon rallied the Silent Majority to stand with him — and against them. Middle America did.

Hence, what did its association with protesters, radicals and Black Power militants do for the Democratic Party?

Where LBJ swept 44 states in 1964 and 61 percent of the vote, in 1968 Humphrey won 13 states and 43 percent.

In 1972, Nixon and Spiro Agnew swept 49 states, routing the champion of the countercultural left, George McGovern.

And the table had been set for California Governor Ronald Reagan, who defied campus rioters threatening him with violence thusly: “If it takes a bloodbath, let’s get it over with.”

Without the riots and bombings of the ’60s and ’70s, there might have been no Nixonian New Majority and no Reagan Revolution.

Today, with the raucous protests against President Trump and his travel ban, the disruption of Congressional town meetings, the blocking of streets every time a cop is involved in a shooting with a black suspect, and the rising vitriol in our politics, it is beginning to look like the 1960s again.

There are differences. In bombings, killings, beatings, arrests, arson, injuries and destruction of property, we are nowhere near 1968.

Still, the intolerant left seems to have melded more broadly and tightly with the Democratic Party of today than half a century ago.

Where Barry Goldwater joked about sawing off the East Coast and “letting it drift out into the Atlantic,” Californians today talk of secession. And much of Middle America would be happy to see them gone.

Where Nixon was credited with the “cooling of America” in 1972, and Reagan could credibly celebrate “Morning in America” in 1984, any such “return to normalcy” appears the remotest possibility now.

As with the EU, the cracks in the USA seem far beyond hairline fractures. Many sense the country could come apart. It did once before. And could Southerners and Northerners have detested each other much more than Americans do today?

Fifty years ago, the anti-Nixon demonstrators wanted out of Vietnam and an end to the draft. By 1972, they had gotten both. The long hot summers were over. The riots stopped.

But other than despising Trump and his “deplorables,” what great cause unites the left today? Even Democrats confess to not knowing Hillary Clinton’s presidential agenda.

From those days long ago, there returns to mind the couplet from James Baldwin’s famous book, from which he took his title:

“God gave Noah the rainbow sign/ No more water, the fire next time.”

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Phillipe Reines, senior political advisor to Hillary Clinton, tweeted this to Genral Flynn and his son Mike Flynn Jr. last night, after it was announced that his Father had resigned from the national security position.

Dear Mike Flynn & Mike Flynn Jr.,

What goes around COMETS around.

And given your pizza obsession…

http://ift.tt/22MNSmt …

xo

Philippe

If you’re unfamiliar with Flynn Jr., he was one of the more prominent people close to the Trump administration who questioned the peculiarities of the Pizzagate story.

In response to Phillipe’s tweet, Hillary felt it necessary to pile on, lecturing the Flynns about the hazards of perpetuating ‘fake news.’

But why?

General Flynn resigned because he might’ve spoken to the Russians about sanctions at a time when he wasn’t authorized to do so, not because of some story about pedophilia taking place in the basement of a Washington DC pizza parlor. So why in the actual fuck would Hillary even reference this in a tweet?

It sounds to me, she is saying ‘fuck with Podesta and Comet Ping Pong and you lose your job.’

Am I wrong?

 

 

Content originally generated at iBankCoin.com

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The French learn quick.

Gunning for the anti-Russian sympathy vote, and perhaps anticipating a Hillry-type outcome in the coming presidential elections, French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron who is currently in second place in the polls with a 22% approval rating, behind Le Pen at 27%, said on Monday he was the target of Russian media “fake news” and his campaign is facing thousands of cyber attacks, according to his party chief.

Richard Ferrand, secretary-general of Macron’s En Marche! (Onwards!) party, said that Russian state-controlled media Russia Today and Sputnik had spread false reports with the aim of swinging public opinion against Macron.

“These attacks are coming from the Russian border,” Ferrand said. “We want a strong Europe. That’s why we’re subject to attacks on our information system from the Russian state.”

“We are in the presence of an orchestrated attempt by a foreign power to destabilize a presidential election candidate,” Ferrand said and called on the French government again to take steps to prevent foreign meddling in the French election campaign.

Ferrand said Moscow looked favorably on the policies of far-right leader Marine Le Pen and center-right candidate Francois Fillon – both election rivals of Macron – and both had been “mysteriously spared” from Russian media criticism.

“If these attacks succeeded, the campaign of En Marche would become extremely difficult, if not impossible,” Ferrand said in Le Monde online.

Ferrand also said the Macron campaign was being hit by “hundreds if not thousands” of attacks probing the campaign’s computer systems from locations inside Russia. Calling for government action to prevent foreign meddling in the election campaigning, Ferrand said: “What we want is for authorities at the highest level to take the matter in hand to guarantee that there is no foreign meddling in our democracy. The Americans saw it but it came to late.” He said about half of these thousands of attacks came mainly from Ukraine and had been organized and coordinated by a “structured group” and not by lone hackers.

With President Donald Trump weighing a thaw in relations with Putin, Macron argues that EU nations need to stick together in dealing with their eastern neighbor, Bloomberg added. While sanctions should be lifted in the long term, they must be kept in place if Russia is meddling in Europe’s democratic processes or using its energy exports as a form of geopolitical blackmail, the official said.

Whereas National Front leader Marine Le Pen has called EU sanctions on Russia “completely stupid” and Republican candidate Francois Fillon has repeatedly opposed them, Macron was part of a government that helped impose the measures and has labeled Fillon a “Putinopile” or Putin fan. “I don’t believe in French people saying that great-power France should be speaking to great-power Russia — good luck with that,” Macron said in January in Berlin. “Russia is indeed in Europe geographically and historically speaking. We have lot of passions together, literature. And Russians live as Europeans. But you have Russian leaders who don’t share our values and our views.”

Macron has jumped in campaigning for the French election and opinion polls make him favorite to win election in May. Ferrand said that Macron, as a staunch pro-European, was a Russian target because he wanted a strong united Europe that had a major role to play in world affairs, including in the face of Moscow. Sputnik earlier this month ran an interview with a conservative French lawmaker accusing Macron, a former investment banker, of being an agent of “the big American banking system”.

“Two big media outlets belonging to the Russian state Russia Today and Sputnik spread fake news on a daily basis, and then they are picked up, quoted and influence the democratic (process),” Ferrand said.

Similar accusations were lobbed at US media outlets by the losing Clinton campaign shortly after the election, accusing most websites who did not support Hillary Clinton of being distributors “fake news.”

Russia Today said it rejected allegations it spread fake news in general and in relation to Macron and the forthcoming French election. “It seems that it has become acceptable to level such serious charges at Russia Today without presenting any evidence to substantiate them, as well as to apply this ‘fake news’ label to any reporting that one might simply find unfavorable,” the news channel said in a statement.

As Reuters adds, Russian newspaper Izvestia has also reported comments from Wikileaks founder Julian Assange who said his organization had “interesting information” about Macron, who opinion polls say would easily beat far-right leader Marine Le Pen in a May 7 runoff.

Soon after the accusations, the Kremlin denied that it was behind media and internet attacks on Macron’s campaign.  Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, replying to a question on a daily conference call, said charges made on Monday by Macron’s party chief, Richard Ferrand, were absurd.

“We didn’t have and do not have any intention of interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, or in their electoral processes in particular,” Peskov told reporters. “That there is a hysterical anti-(President Vladimir) Putin campaign in certain countries abroad is an obvious fact.”

Well, in a world of “he said, she said” fake media accusations, there is nothing to lose by stating something that can not be disproven, and at best, can lead to some marginal sympathy by anti Russian voters.

Meanwhile, Sputnik, in a comment on Tuesday, said Ferrand’s accusations were false and lacked any evidence, and represented an attempt at spinning public opinion.

“By citing various opinions expressed by people involved in the election campaign, Sputnik always covers events as they are,” it said. Alas, these days any time news emerges which hurt’s ones political agenda, the response is rather generic: accuse it of being a source of “fake news”, as has now happened first in the US, then in Germany, and now in France.

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