- Hint At Coming Communication Changes The long-awaited arrival of 2% inflation cheered Federal Reserve policymakers at their May 1-2 Federal Open Market Committee meeting and confirmed their inclination to raise short-term interest rates again "soon" and keep raising them "gradually."

Names have been put forward to be Italian FinMin in the press but one appears to be standing out: Paolo Savona. Savona (82 years old) is calling for the re-introduction of the old lira and a 5 minute summary of his views on the euro is available here (in Italian

-Clarity over the new Italian coalition government programme has only provided a brief view of better times. -Optimism over an Argentina-IMF deal can only stretch so far, and the undercurrent of USD demand in the global monetary system continues to be ignored by the Trump-haters.

There is a decent concession for the Bund 10y heading into this auction, which limits the chances of a technically uncovered auction. However, the market is fairly immune to such events and no longer sees auctions as a particularly good litmus test of German Bund demand.

Nothing terribly revealing emerged from Tuesday's confirmation hearing for two of President Trump's nominees to fill seats on the short-handed Federal Reserve Board.

(PRAGUE) – A weaker-than-projected Czech koruna that speeds up the Czech National Bank’s efforts to boost interest rates to a more normal level can’t be excluded, even if this is not monetary authorities’ central scenario at this point, CNB Governor Jiří Rusnok told ITC in a recent interview.

Broker Fixing calls- cont'd focus on $3ml. It was all about the Libor fix again on Monday- EDM8 was lifted on ~27k from 97.69 up to 97.71, the highest since April 2nd

In Brief: -MPC likely to vote 7-2 to keep rates on hold (a few outside calls for 9-0 or 6-3) -McCafferty and Saunders likely to dissent again -weaker run of data and Carney (Apr 19) comments in focus -GDP f/c likely lower this year; unch growth projections further out -CPI f/c in 4Q likely lowered in all years

AMELIA ISLAND, FLA. - Though the Federal Open Market Committee left the federal funds rate unchanged last Wednesday, the Federal Reserve's policymaking body signaled it will raise rates further this year, but Fed officials give no indication they want to move aggressively.

ITC Option Recap: Bund: RXM8 vol breached 3% yesterday , which is (another) new low… However there was glimmer of hope for the MM community as the underlying had a 92 tick range easily paying for the 29 tick a day breakeven gamma rent… And we still have 21 days to expiry so there’s plenty of time to trade the gamma.