In Washington, the suspect in the White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting will be appearing in Washington DC the DOJ is saying that the suspect was trying to target Trump administration officials and overseas, the U.S.Iran war closing in on the two month mark.
While we've seen ceasefires between the US and Iran along with Israel and Hezbollah, the major sticking point remains the battle for control in the Strait of. as dueling blockades continue.
A second round of peace talks also continue to be delayed, with Trump stopping the US side from traveling to Pakistan over the weekend.
Trump saying Iran does not know who their leadership is.
And also in the Middle East, Pakistan's money market is showing heightened volatility and rising pressure because of the tensions in the region.
Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Scott Basin saying discussions with countries including And Asian allies about US dollar swap lines are ongoing.
Joining me this morning to weigh in is Patrick L.
Young, Chairman and Founder of Exchange Invest.
Good morning, Patrick.
Thank you so much for joining us.
The U.S.Iran war continues to be the dominant geopolitical factor for global markets.
We are seeing oil prices elevated.
So given the fact that the ceasefire between the US and Iran is still intact, how tense are relations right now?
Relations are obviously very tense because quite simply what the Trump regime is trying to do at the moment is wait out the clock.
The Iranians don't want to stop producing oil, but they're running out of storage.
They're looking at bringing together out of date barges and oil tankers, putting them beside Karg Island in order to manage to fill them full of oil, which if nothing else is going to give the US target practice.
Should the Iranians decide to break the agreement.
At the same time Trump's saying there's no clear leadership in Iran.
There is clear leadership in Iran, of course, but what Trump's saying is quite clear.
The people in public who are doing the negotiation are merely puppets.
The president, it looks as if he needs a prosthetic leg.
He is with us in many ways, in spirit, but in much less body than he once was.
He's not a very Very healthy man as a result of injuries last month.
And of course what does that tell us?
Well, ultimately the IRGC, the Revolutionary Guards who control so much of the economy, they're really the puppeteers here who are controlling the negotiations.
Trump's trying to cut through the noise and get an agreement with Iran, but ultimately Iran have to back down and get rid of their nuclear weapons threat.
Patrick, there are a lot of moving parts here.
So let's talk about the impact on economies in the Middle East.
Pakistan's money market fund is seeing high volatility, while US Treasury Secretary Scott Besson says there are ongoing discussions about US dollar swap lines for Gulf allies.
So given the fact that we saw the IMF slash its global growth forecast, what are the impacts here on Middle Eastern countries in the region?
Well, of course, I mean the, the actions of the IMF are one thing.
I mean, at all points in time when anything volatile comes out of left field and it's not already on your spreadsheet, cut growth because that gets you a few headlines, reminds people that the IMF exists.
Were the serious business is going on here, and a very interesting move it was by Scott Besson because in extending swap lines, I mean to people like the UAE, clearly the UAE suddenly came out and said, well, we don't need the money actually, but what he's saying is there is Dollar liquidity here in order to pump into the region.
There's already been a spat.
The Pakistanis have had a problem.
The UAE withdrew their, I mean, equivalent to 21% of the overall reserves of the country was withdrawn at short notice just a couple of weeks ago.
Interestingly, Kuwait and Saudi came in behind that and very quickly pumped that money back in.
But of course it comes at a price.
What is the price?
Pakistan is now being restricted, or at least it's under Saudi pressure to not.
Export armaments to certain other regimes such as Syria and Sudan.
So therefore there's a huge geopolitical game going on behind here.
But also what is Scott Besson saying?
Well, Scott Besson is saying the thing that nobody wants to talk about, which is that if you want to do world trade, if you want to have a currency to do it in, guess what?
It's still the US dollar that we're actually transacting in, despite the fact that we're at another point of peak froth of everybody saying the US dollar is over.
Well it's interesting you mentioned that Patrick.
This week is going to be a big week for central banks.
It's not just the Federal Reserve.
We'll be hearing from other central banks as well and policymakers.
So I do want to shift our focus on over to the UK elections will be taking place on May 7th, and it could be a high stakes litmus test for Starmer's Labor government.
So give us your take as we inch closer to that date.
OK, so it's local elections, a multiplicity of local councils, mayoralty, so on.
They're coming up on May 7th.
Traditionally it's seen as being a litmus test, of course, for the government.
Truly there's not a lot of doubt in terms of what the outcome's going to be for Keir Starmer's governing party.
I mean, it's going to be either dreadful, more dreadful, or even more dreadful.
Still, Starmer has lost the country.
He's on the ropes at this point in time.
He's going to ultimately, if he's not pushed out during the course of this week because actually parliament is in recess because of these elections.
He's going to get pushed out of power as a result of the election that's going to take place on May 7th.
He's finished.
The Epstein crisis has managed to kill him off because he's been simply incapable of running the country, as we always said was going to be the case.
Now how that impacts on UK relations with the US?
Well, of course it's very interesting because we've got Prince Charles landing with the Queen this evening in the USA and how marvelous that is to see traditionally, historically the biggest, or one of the biggest investors in the United States of America, the United Kingdom.
And obviously that's an all stakes to play for game at the point in time when the Prime Minister, hapless as he has been, has managed to effectively dirty his copybook with President Trump, and therefore Prince Charles is going to be sent in, in order to smooth diplomatically.
As only the House of Saxe-Coburg Gotha, better known as Windsor these days, can possibly manage to do with the ethereal ability of royal relations to President Trump, who's obviously going to be ecstatic to see the king and queen at the White House having tea with himself and Melania later today.
Well that is something we will be monitoring very closely in the nation's capital.
Patrick, and finally, before I let you go, I do want to ask you about prediction markets now enforcement against insider trading is starting to pick up the DOJ charging a US soldier with banking on Maduro's capture.
And interestingly enough, France is also investigating whether a hair dryer was used to manipulate Paris temperatures.
So what is going on when it comes to the world of prediction markets?
Look, this is a fascinating topic.
I was actually one of the people who first invented these prediction markets well over 30 years ago as a founder of Intrade GSX, amongst other things, IntreTrade sports, and really what we've got here is a very interesting thing.
Lots of money has flowed into the existing prediction markets, but not a lot of holistic thought has really taken place around the edges of how they should be governed, managed and run.
And therefore we can't possibly get into all of these insights.
Or trading issues right at the moment.
But alas, in the race to get hugely funded in the race for customer dollars, there is a problem because the prediction markets need to actually think much, much better about how they're going to predict their own future.
And at the moment that thought is lacking because what do we know about operating markets?
Well, you operate a market very, very successfully day to day by being a linear thinker, but actually to be great in prediction markets, you need to be a lateral thinker.
Patrick, we will have to leave it there as we are counting down to the opening bell here at the New York Stock Exchange.
Always great talking to you.
Thank you so much for joining us, Patrick.
