ECB vice president, Luis de Guindos, remarks
– European banks not likely to recover from the virus crisis before 2022
– The recovery of the Eurozone economy will be a vital factor in banks‘ solvency
He’s not really touching on anything important in his lecture today, but the ECB in general doesn’t have much to offer as they

The latest BofA fund manager survey results are out
I think the sentiment that this was a bear market rally has died quite a while back. The fact that the Nasdaq is making record highs and the S&P 500 itself is close to its own all-time highs is continuing to put that argument to rest –

Forex news from the European trading session – 17 August 2020
Headlines:
Markets:
– JPY leads, NZD lags on the day
– European equities little changed; E-minis up 0.3%

Bloomberg with the headline, citing OPEC on the matter
Just a heads up to the meeting later this week, in case we hear of how the compliance issue is going or any possible plans for future production cuts and what not.

This comes after the PBOC injected liquidity into the system earlier today
The move helped to bolster Chinese equities, with the Shanghai Composite ending the day 2.3% higher to start the new week.

Comments by US commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross
– US and China talks are continuing at various levels
– Looking to close loopholes to prevent Huawei from getting access to US technology
This just further cements the likely narrative that anything that may be discussed at the trade review will keep this facade up despite China not living up

But don’t expect much before Friday
The usual round of negotiations will start off with tomorrow’s dinner, before getting into more serious talks on Wednesday and Thursday. Both sides will wrap things up on Friday before we are likely to hear from Barnier and Frost once again via their respective pressers.

Some late-Friday news which speaks to US-China relations.
If you’ve been following along US-China relations continue to deteriorate, the latest being talks between the two countries on trade scheduled to take place this weekend were … ‚delayed‘:

Deficits are a major challenge to the dollar-based system
On August 15, 1971 — exactly 49 years ago — the gold-pegged Bretton Woods system collapsed.
After nations began to demand redeeming dollars for gold, President Richard Nixon shocked the world with the following after secret meetings at Camp David:

13F filings from Berkshire Hathaway
Other swings in positions show increased stakes in: