Bloomberg daybreak europe. Im anna edwards. Manus weve got a feast of breaking news for you. Lets kick it off with ing. Ahead of what the market had penciled in at 1. 40 8 billion euros. S is a bank that gets gives Technology Revolution whole new meaning. Withre going into markets 14bricks and mortar and point 15 for them. Billion. Ofit of 1. 65 the net of 1. 143. Fors a little bit ahead the net results for the First Quarter of 2017. Facing significant penalties over the lack of data in regard to payments. Will have a conversation at 6 20 a. M. This morning. Anna we will welcome him to his new role. The french insurance giant, weve had numbers from them but an update on strategy, they say they intend to ipo the companies u. S. Operations, which is an interesting headline just passing over the bloomberg right now. They are talking about firstquarter revenue of 31. 6 billion. Just a touch below where it was this time last your but not by a great deal. Property and casualty revenue a little bit higher than the 13. 3 billion previously. They plan a Share Buyback, so that could be of interest to investors. They say they intend to ipo the u. S. Operations and the ceo took over last year, aiming to preserve profitability through cost cuts and new technology investments. Hes been trying to tap growth from health insurance. Theyre giving us an update on other matters this morning, talking about a Share Buyback in u. S. Operations. Manus one picture will dominate discussions, and thats its this man, mr. Comey who has been fired. Anna weve had numbers reiterating the fullyear target of 220 million euros. The integration is on track. All that sounds pretty positive. We will speak to the companys u. K. Dent and ceo at 7 20 time. As you were saying, the Bigger Picture story is around the dismissal of comey, the fbi director. Democrats scream shocking and nick sony and. And nixonian. King manus north korea is ready to do another nuclear test. This, the markets are closed in asia. Anna the asia session is just positive overall but the cost is down, they are playing catchup. Pi is down. U. S. It raises questions about implications on the way Trump Administration acts. Manus people are beginning to raise the does this impeachment risk across markets . Lets look at whats going on with the dollar. You have the first drop in three days, the reserve bank of dallas president saying pressures are muted and its possible for the economy to unfold in a weaker way. Just a little bit of acknowledgment that not all is rosy in the u. S. Garden, so to speak. Anna lets turn back to this Political Development in washington. President donald trump fired fbi director james comey over the investigation into russian interference in the last election. Its too restore public trust and confidence. Lets get to our Washington Bureau chief. You are up late, a big story. Talk us through the thinking in the bureau at the moment in terms of the timing of this and the significance of it. For a president who sort of drives on surprises and controversy, this was a very big surprise in washington. Not hadident had anything on his public schedule for a couple of days and said he was really just planning for his big overseas trip next week. Then at the end of the day he dropped his big surprise. He claimed it was because of the way comey had investigated Hillary Clintons use of a private email server when she was secretary of state, although all of those facts were known at the time that trump was elected and inaugurated, and asked him to stay on the job. I was just going to ask you about the broader picture here. One of our economist writing that it seems constitutional, what the president has done, but it does violate powerful ,olitical norms comey is only the second fbi director ever to be fired. They are supposed be independent, theyre able to follow investigations wherever they lead, including the oval office. Manus terms of what the democrats are calling for, they are calling for a special prosecutor, theyre calling for an investigation because the debate now from a market perspective is, do you think this raises the specter of an impeachment challenge to trump . Is that something that will be begin to be discussed today . Seems ae moment it little premature because its within his power to fire and fbi director. Republicans are now raising exactly why he did this and whether it looks illegitimate because comey was the one leading the investigation into possible ties between the Trump Campaign and the russian government. Anna thanks for joining us today, good to get your perspective on the program. Manus lets get into the markets aspect of it. Mark is in singapore. There was one moment when you said there was you were surprised there was not more market reaction. Starts its premature to flying the impeachment banner. You may question the validity of it, but the market seems muted at the moment. Veryutely, the markets are muted. When the initial news broke in the twilight of post u. S. Trading, there was a little bit of a downtick in the dollar and u. S. Futures but nothing special. Since then its been quiet and overall, asian markets have traded ok. There might be more of a reaction later on. It does raise a few questions about the timing. The margin, it undermines trump s credibility a little bit. The market is still betting on the expectations have been massively lowered and delayed, but theres still an expectation that fiscal stimulus will come in at some point. The more that trump gets undermined and cannot past policy, the more that will come through to the markets. The marketolitics in thinking, its all about his ability to deliver other policy or capitol hill and in particular, tax reform. Definitely. The health care bill, for example, was a sign of his power and ability to get legislation passed and thats why it is important. The more that his Approval Rating falls, the more republicans who disagree with him will be willing to challenge him. We know the democrats will be even more adamant that they want to block him from any victory. There is a bit of risk in that regard and the markets might react more negatively than the asian markets seem to have perceived it. Over here it is largely overlooked. Its important to note is probably going to just be a shortterm thing. The 24hourover news cycle, we will move on and forget about it within five days. Manus thank you very much. Politics,s stick with but it different story, south koreas new president has pledged to unify the nation after nine years of conservative rule. It led to the impeachment of his predecessor. Manus moon pledge to be a lean president , and shery ahn is in seoul. Great coverage on the election so far. Here we are, we have the results. What is in a for the new president . Is it the politics of north korea or the governance of korean industry . Where do you think he will focus first . On thanking all of them will be very important, but given the mood here on the ground, it would have to be tackling conglomerate reforms. A lot of people are angry over scandal, this will be key for the new president. President moon was sworn in after a stunning election victory with 41 of the vote against only 24 for his opponent, the conservative. This is at a time when were seeing voter turnout at the highest level in about two decades. Unprecedented, he doesnt have a transition pe riod. Just an hour ago he passed through here to head to the blue house. In about 15 minutes or so, he will have a press briefing and announce his nominees for prime minister, for president ial secretary, and then just get right to work. To thealready talked joint chiefs of staff about security here in south korea. Anna thank you very much, shery ahn reporting for us on the ground in seoul. Lets turn our attention to china. Gains slowed more than expected in april, adding to signs of potential easing in the reflation trade. Manus economists had expected following seven point 6 in march. Cpi for april climbed to 1. 2 , more than expected. Eric, good morning to you. Weve just thrown a whole load of chinese Inflation Numbers that everybody, that basically the message is, for a long time china was exporting deflation. Central banks were getting a bit of help as they were trying to generate inflation. Does it raise red flags for you . Not yet. Something to keep an eye on, but the reflation story started at the beginning of 2016 when they double down on the same policyption, prescriptions they put in place right after the Global Financial crisis, which was more money, investment into real estate and Infrastructure Projects and that manufacturing industry. That caused their growth rates is stopped falling and start accelerating in truth. We maybe just reaching the kind of bump in the road. We are not yet off the road. I see the numbers and they are quite staggering. 926,ave committed nearly or the aspiration is that, call it a trillion dollars on everything. That is a huge infrastructure push. Not all of it will come to weition, but sometimes forget that the next big global ambition. They are not done spending, not by a longshot. The economy has a colossal amount of excess capacity in all these areas we are talking about. Some of this is already going abroad and some of it will remain in china. It is a way of buying a bit more growth for a few more years. Doubling down on the excess capacity problem theyve already got. The longterm average is not great but the shortterm remains positive. Anna thank you very much eric. A lot more to calm here on bloomberg daybreak europe. The ingill break down earnings numbers. We will have a conversation with the ceo. This is bloomberg. Firstquarterrted numbers, topping estimates, partly due to strength in his turkish banking division. The ceo joins us now. Good to see you. Thank you very much for joining us this morning. You got a firstquarter net income of 1. 4 billion, beating estimates. We talk a lot about the recovery in europe. Pmis are strong. How optimistic is ing about loan growth and about the business Going Forward through the rest of 2017 . Do you share in the markets optimism . Koos i must say we are optimistic. At the same time, is not so much the market we will be looking at. I would rather look at the amount of clients. Its gone up from a total of 36 million, thats a total in terms of clients. If you look at primary clients, its 9. 85. As mentioned, the total amount of loans we make net is 5. 7 billion this quarter. Customers are fairly happy, in eight countries we are the total retail bank, so we do see client growth on our side, and thats. Art of what makes me happy im optimistic about that part. A very good morning to you. Congratulations on your new role. Can i ask about the investment that ing has made in judah ties digitization . Does that program threaten the cost assumption . Overall, dithink gitization is both an expense factor and in total we will set aside 800 million to invest in dir digitize asian gitaztion. We expect we will have 900 million lower calls following the investments were making right now, and at the same time working hard to make sure that the customer gets a nicer delivery. Results of that should already come now and improvement of digital services, what we did letsrder is, we said take a lot of the paperwork out. Over the years, you should see more of these friendly things benefiting our customers as well. Capital,st looking at 14. 5 and i suppose the debate higher potential for payouts to shareholders versus acquisition. Where are you with that debate and what can you say to shareholders in terms of capital retention versus pay out . Is, weverall, what we do have a decent amount of dividends that we are paying. Sure thatave to make the 14. 5 is a nice number, but 3. 5 coming. E basel we like to reserve that we can pay a longerterm progressive dividend over time. You need to have adequate offers a we need to get some of the regulatory uncertainty out of the way and that is not white done yet. Thats why its difficult to make one specific capital target right now. Anna how concerned are you about the basel 4 process . The eu and u. K. Is not been on the same page in that particular process. How optimistic are you that Common Ground will be found on capital flaws . Hear as much stories probably as you do on this, like who says what, and where are we right now in the process of negotiating, and are there exceptions . Agrees, thel question is to what degree will the European Union except this . Its difficult to navigate. Pricing bit cautious in longer dated assets. Thats the only way you can navigate with certainty. You will be a lucky cfo if you find out what kind of capital you have to store up. Lets talk about the business expansion. We mentioned turkey. Do still harbor ambitions to grow in turkey, given the geopolitical and social unrest . Is that still a market ambition, alongside poland . Koos overall, if you look at our turkish business in the First Quarter, what you see is, we have delivered decent results. Actually if you look at the nonperforming loans, its somewhat in line with what in essence the Business Unit has done quite well over this overer, but you do expect time, the domestic smaller corporates will maybe have some more difficulty, but weve not seen anything in the First Quarter of that kind, so in that sense were happy with the way to businesses running right now. Are not madelans yet, but you dont do that raised on one quarter of volatility or turmoil. One of my colleagues points out the focus this quarter could be on margins. Where are you happy with your margin performance, and where do you wanted to improve . Overall, what you see is that our margins are fine, but at the same timewere dropping our savings rate on the retail side and thats supporting the margins quite much. Retail Savings Rates are approaching somewhere by the end of this year if things continue as they do right now, theyre getting closer to zero. You cannot probably support your margins by lowering savings rate. Longerterm, the more strategic part of the margins we need to look at and thats why banks in general are hoping for the most increase on Interest Rates rather than a decrease. Manus thank you so much for joining us this morning, the ceo over at ing. Anna up next, keep calm and carry on. The ecb willssage try to give off. This is bloomberg. Manus 2 30 in the afternoon in tokyo. Down come as donald trump fires his main man over at the fbi. A little bit of acknowledgment that the stress in the u. S. Economy might be up for question. Were seen a little bit of a mixed picture across some of the asian markets. Focusing on china, we had that , and thetoday crackdown on leverage that we have generally been seeing in china. Not phasing international investors. The msc a China Index Holding on to this years gains. The shanghai composite close to the october low. Though it is a little higher today. Of slower chinese Growth Potential he has alreadys will volker to Commodity Prices to some extent this year. Today and oil both higher and copper is among the most preferred commodities. The bank is seeing improved Global Growth and supply discipline setting conditions for higher prices. Meanwhile goldman saying commodities are doing well as the fed tightens. Speaking of the fed, weve been seeing expectations ramping up with bond traders not just for june but also september. The twoyear treasury yield climbing ahead of the june fed meeting. We did see a two year yield touch 1. 35 tuesday, the highest since march. The bloomberg dollar index also reaching its strongest in almost a month in yesterdays session. Here is dollaryen. After three days of gains were seen it coming off slightly. Part of that is also a bid for the safe haven yen. Some of it also coming off some of the fed comments for example. Of daybreakedition is available on your bloomberg and your mobile. The cover story, a big overnight development for our european viewers. President trump fired his fbi director james comey after Justice Department officials concluded he mishandled the investigation into Hillary Clintons emails. No mention was made into whether Trump Campaign officials colluded with russian meddling into the 2016 president ial campaign. Democrats are making links between the investigations on capitol hill and the russian rope russian probe. The white house says its all to do with the emails and hillary clinton. Its not a constitutional crisis because technically donald is within his Constitutional Rights to do what he did. If you go back to the clinton era. , the eiastry data figures today confirm the withdrawal, it would be the biggest image or drop since 2017. By. 6 . L prices are up and daybreak focuses on china, we talked about this a little bit this morning. Slowed, adding signs of potential easing, perhaps not what central banker say in the west. They been happy to take that inflation from china see it pass through in western markets. Manus its amazing how we flipflop and the question is whether it continues. One man has questioned a few things, the german finance offer Interest Rates may be coming to an end. Anna saying he expects Interest Rates to normalize shortly. To theraghi travels dutch capital to face grilling on Monetary Policy today. Hes likely to reiterate that the recovery is firming and broadening, his job now is to make sure he doesnt tighten policy to send. Manus our guest is still with us. As sheing to say steady goes. Theres a wonderful piece on the bloomberg this morning saying he had a telephone call with the bank of england governor. Mario draghi will stay will say steady as she goes today, while he . Hes already done it once. Now, the euro area is in okd times, everything looks on the face of it. Underneath of course, the same problems lurk under the water, the problems of unresolved accumulation of debt and all the rest of it are still there, still to be resolved. Mario draghi cannot do much about that on his own. Thefor the time being, for next year or maybe two years, were on an upswing, and we should be pleased about that. One thing that happened over the weekend makes us a bit more please, the fact that macron won in france. I think they are decent goalkeepers in terms of taking shots against the euro. As the german elections loom, some in germany are trying to make the most of the macron victory. Less austerity in europe is the answer here. Angela merkel was quick to snuff out any hint that along with macron she might do the and thatralization, would be great. That would be a golden scenario. She is after legacy issues like saving the euro between her and at the moment it doesnt look like that from the cards. Theres no appetite for that in germany. Manus you say the abject failure to forecast inflation means that all this talk and speculation of tighter policy is premature. Your unshaken in your view of when this choreography changes . I think its been all about that for some time. Manus he also talks about not sticking to the debt limits as well. Them tightening materially, they might go 25 bits or Something Like that, but materially tightening, i dont see that happening for the next year or couple of years. Blankfeins lament, hes been talking about the difficulties politically that europe faces for the rest of the year. He said youve got the italian and german election and it each one, you have to get it right, otherwise it becomes existential. Thats the problem that despite what happened in the netherlands and france, its a problem the euro still faces. You have brexit in trump, and then macron. The germans, the liberal thenpolitan elites, and the decider will be the big one. Manus you look at volatility in the markets, its dropping away. Its not too early to be prepared for the next existential crisis. It has the propensity, thats the great thing about the italians. As someone who has italian relations and so on. They may disrupt europe or their own pop the may distrust europe but they distrust their own politicians even more. The appetite for withdrawing from europe is really pretty limited. Ownappetite to punish their politicians is high. There has been high antipathy for the euro, but we will see how that plays out in the electoral voting booth. Manus we have more results from walt disney. They failed to ease investor concern about the cablevision as espnrofits slumped continue to lose subscribers. Bob iger onke to tuesday after the Company Reported secondquarter earnings. This was a particularly important project for me. It for 17 years and im extremely proud of what our team ultimately designed and created. Im proud of how its been operated over the first year and proud of how that Chinese People and taken to it. We are probably just a few days away from hitting 10 million in attendance. It had been her target to hit that in the first year. We are running ahead of where we had hoped we would be. Attendancehirds of is from outside the shanghai area. Thats very interesting because it suggests this is a national destination, which we did not really expect. We thought two thirds of attendants would be from within the shanghai region. Its very encouraging. We have a piece of land thats very large in terms of not only the size but the ability to building out, and a willing partner to enable us to do that. We announced expansion before we open, so were building a large tory story land as we speak story land. We believe given the success of the business already in the size of the land and interest of our partners to continue to invest in it, that you will see substantial expansion of this particular facility over the next 510 years. That i think is very, very encouraging. Weve always believed there are other opportunities in china, but our First Priority has been to open this one and to do it right. Since its less than the euro, it would be premature to speculate about anything we might be doing in another market in china but we hope at some point that opportunity presents itself. Manus that was walt disney chairman and ceo bob iger speaking on bloomberg tv. You can always click on tv and influence the conversation. Click on ask a question at the bottom of the screen. Up, what does brexit mean for the bank of england . Will we get any mood on rates until after brexit . This is bloomberg. News comingood through, adjusted profit read euros. Es, 744 million the are confirming reduction of crude oil. All benefiting from the crude betterce which is 55 than it was in the First Quarter of 2017. Target inon of the terms of net income. Anna lets get the Bloomberg Business flash. Rally sinceenure the arrival of the iphone season become the first u. S. Company work 800 billion dollars. Shares have continued to rise slowingthe firm reports sales. Its climbed 33 so far this year. Inflation in the u. S. Grocery market is waning and it expects better pricing in the second half to boost sales growth. Firstquarter earnings reported ahead of analyst estimates, following costcutting through a dutch belgian merger last year. We will speak to the president and ceo of the company at 7 20 u. K. Time. While disneys earnings have failed to assuage domestic concerns about its cable division. Profit in the business slumped last quarter as espn continue to lose subscribers and spend more to televise games. Defendingisney ceo espn, saying it is a product in demand. A very healthyl and profitable business, one of our most profitable businesses. Stable of live sports that is licensed for a long time that will serve it extremely well and is serving as well today on a traditional platform and starting to serve it well on new platforms and will serve it well for the foreseeable future. Its a product that is in demand. Walmart is preparing to pay around 300 million to resolve an investigation into bribery, according to people familiar with the matter. It would mark a significant concession by the department of justice which is sought at least twice that amount as recently as last year. Walmart declined to comment. Manus thank you much for the roundup. Lets take you to soul in south korea. This is the new man in charge of south korea. He wants to get tough on south koreas biggest companies. President. Ew said i will do whatever i can to bring peace to the world. It will be an interesting headtohead between trump and the new president of south korea. Ambassadors of eu countries meet today to discuss the brexit mandate in brussels. Meanwhile a Rate Decision from the bank of england tomorrow. Saying the negotiations will keep the bank of england frozen, and saying Interest Rates will remain unchanged until the u. K. Exits the eu. Our guest is still with us in the studio. John, good morning to you. Do you agree that rates will stay on hold until after brexit . John, what is your outlook for rates in the u. K. . Its likely they are not going anywhere anytime soon. The debate is a pretty balanced one. Depends where growth and inflation had over the next couple of years. We are on the more pessimistic side of things, if im honest. We take the slowdown in q1 as a sign of things to come. Struggle to keep up the pace of spending we saw last year or in recent years. We think companies will get increasingly worried about what lies beyond arch 2019 when brexit happens. And easing of policy is still more likely. Chart in have a nice terms of who is going to trump who, in terms of growth, pardoned upon. We havent seen that for quite a while. Not since 2010. Its one of those moderately ironic moments in terms of what we face versus what they face. An interesting poll was conducted right after the brexit , of who thought the impact of brexit would be positive and who thought it would be negative. Right after brexit, rich people on the whole thought the effect of brexit would be negative. Poor people thought it would be positive. They took the pole again a month or so ago across the same categories and now everyone thinks its going to be negative. And the people thinking it would be the most negative are the poorest, and that judgment is correct, in our view. Theyre going to hit the poorest people most. Anna and we have to talk about retail and consumers. You make a point in your notes about strength in the u. K. Economy, saying one of the reasons the population voted for this, but you also say consumers are not forwardlooking. If theyre not seeing the negative effects as it comes through, maybe they dont take about that or care about it. The impact is on inflation and real incomes, so they go out and spend now ahead of those increases. Theres a lot of evidence in the retail sales picture that that is actually the case. Effectthat will have an in terms of how the mpc votes. Senate. Efore the she wanted to make the point that its good to have a debate. You see that cyrus interview. Its more restricted in usable than usual. I think we are at a tipping point. We had some strong tailwinds in the second half of last year. Now we think its become a more mixed picture. At the moment, inflation is rising above target. Growth is holding up ok and there still an expectation that growth this year will be 2 . If that happens, rate hikes are more likely than not. Therefore the debate is going in that direction. I think its still early at the moment. Anna the polls suggest theresa may will be victorious in the election. Thats what the polls suggest. Everyone will be interested in what they plan to spend money on , how much stimulus they want to put into the economy. What do you see in terms of tax and spend plans . Without the manifestoes, its hard to know exactly what the plans are going to be. At this point, a fiscally mutual continuation is most likely. If the economy gets into the trouble where anticipating been in due course we could see some fiscal easing. The first order of events will be a slowdown in the second will be Monetary Policy response and fiscalrd will be response. Manus ive had a slight debate with a number of traders on twitter. Lets have a look at volatility, its getting crunched in terms of the gilt market. Where do we stand . The is it say to you about gilt market . We would not want to be short of guilt, to be honest with you. There are reasons to be worried about sovereign creditworthiness , but thats what we think this bid. L about, a safe haven , that qe mightct not be finished with. Its outperform significantly against treasuries all year. Anna we will have to leave it there. This is bloomberg. The white house says the fbi director dismissal is over his handling of Hillary Clintons emails. M kratz say trump is undermining the russian probe. Was swornident moon in after a decided win yesterday. He pledges to push for peace with north korea and get tough on governance. Manus Producer Prices in china climbed less than forecasted last month. Have we seen a peak in the global reflation trade . It is bloomberg daybreak europe. I am manus cranny in london. Anna im an edwards 7 00 in the morning. News out of the japanese car sector. Manus a Share Buyback in toyotas numbers. Net income 1. 83 trillion yen. From my estimates, the net income that there would be 3. 24. 1. 83 is a miss. ¥50 billioning back s worth of stock. That is a headline. This is a company that has seen sales in the u. S. Drop every month this year and subsidizing cars to the tune of 3499 on have subsidized. The big news is the 250 ¥17. 5nyen buyback and trillion for the full year. Net income on first read looks as if it is a miss. You can follow this on top live go in terms of the actual numbers. Forecast,ollar in the down from 115 originally. Softbank, the Telecoms Company reporting numbers this morning. Lets get those. Based over in japan. Japanese corporates coming through this hour. ¥76. 3 billion off again operating profits against 165. 2 billion yen. That looks to be weaker than estimated on the operating profit line. If we look at the q4 net line 568. 9 billion against a different looking ¥58 billion. A mix against the forecast and part of the reason for that is they are booking a loss, a ¥252. 8 billion derivative loss in the last full year. That looks to be messing with the p l. They are saying losses from Financial Instruments in this , reporting this derivative loss. In the u. K. , we have numbers to broadcast. Itv losing their ceo. Stepping down from the business. They say as anticipated, guidance for the year removed remains changed. A big focus on the top line here. How theyre balancing the creative side of things, production with ad revenues. Avenue 500 million pounds. 731 million. It is all about the balance of those two areas of revenue. It has also been talked of as a takeover target, itv. Liberty global said earlier this week the u. K. Broadcaster could be interesting if trading at a lower multiple. The ceo said they were not currently working on a takeover of itv and remain confident in the u. K. Market. In the broadcasting world, and update their. Mliv ,od you can get all of the news going through in terms of guidance for the year, net income of 1. 5 trillion and yen. Forecast 27. 5, the estimate was for 28. 28. They are pumping this out realtime. For thorpe from Fourth Quarter comes in at 398 billion. The futures are behind. The debate is whether you think Donald Trumps move firing the director of the fbi, whether that is a distinctly risk off move by him. Does it show him to be the ability to make oneoff moves that the markets are completely unexpected of. That is what we are trying to ascertain. Asa other legislation, such tax reform, that is the big question. Since this news broke, u. S. Futures have been down by. 2 depending on the index. Move, european equities seem to be more downside than asian equities, up three. 3 . Radar, showing some moves to the upside. A mixed picture if you look at the shanghai composite, weaker but getting support from japanese markets in particular and the hong kong market, s p futures pointing down. Manus bond markets, an opening flurry. The dollar index down. 2 . The president over at dallas saying were worried about inflation, using words like muted. The economy will unfold in a weaker way. Have a look at the bond board and you understand where we are with booms bunds. Equities are lower, bund futures opening up. Normalization, the finance minister in germany says. From the European Central bank, get ready for normalization. Past 7 00. Inutes here is Juliette Saly with the first word news. Juliette south koreas new president has taken office today with plenty on his plate. Markets have given a muted response to the win where he took 41 of the vote. Jail, hepredecessor in faces threats from the north, worries over u. S. Protectionism and with the de facto head of samsung, the countrys Biggest Company behind bars on bribery charges. With a month until the uks general election, theresa may is set out to woo middle england. Heruses an interview with husband to show her softer side. Her main rival called it the labor parties program is a blistering tirade against greedy bankers and heartless bosses. U. S. President donald trump has forces in thesh fight to ray take brockett. Made overon was strong objections from u. S. Ally turkey which maintains the tooish fighters are militant in the country. The bank of england probably wont make any policy moves before brexit negotiations are concluded according to the National Institute of economic and social research. It comes ahead of the boe washed latest policy meeting tomorrow where no rate change is expected. The u. K. Business group says investors should have more power over executive pay. The institute of directors wants to force companies to put or more of 30 shareholders to a second vote. It would rebuild trust in corporate leadership which the iod sis is facing a crisis of confidence. Chinas Producer Prices rose more slowly in april, signs of a potential is in the using of global reflation. 6. 4 percent rise from a year earlier, below economist forecasts. Down from the 7. 6 gain in march. Meanwhile, consumer in china rose slightly more than expected. Global news 24 hours a day, powered by more than 2600 journalists and analysts in more you can findtries more stories on the bloomberg at top. It has been risk on across asia despite the coming out of the states and north korea indicating it is willing to fire a nuclear missile. Getting back to 17 month highs. The hong kong hang seng is leading gains in asia. At a 21 month high and the csi at 300 snapping that long losing streak it has been on. The cost be coming back online but lower. On monday, it was at a record high. Looking at the stocks we have been watching in the region, China Life Insurance is what you are seeing in hong kong. Rising to a high as we see a rally in equities. After the came out bell yesterday, posting its biggest loss in a decade. The first time investors had a chance to respond to the price. Csi in australia falling heavily. This is due to the fact it has possibly hedged a little against what the market was looking for. Cpi and ppi out of china, this chart is interesting on the bloomberg. You can see these bars showing on theth month of gains factory floor in china but coming off those eightyear highs in february. Elsewhere, a little fall coming through in the official pmi number, which is that blue line. Perhaps this story of easing in the global reflation trade. Manus thank you very much for the roundup. Juliette saly with the latest on data and markets. Donald trump has fired james comey amid the agencys investigation into russian interference in last years election. He said the bureau needed new leadership to restore public trust and confidence. Business weeks editor has more. Of ifre will be questions this action was taken so trump and the administration could put someone in who would be more friendly to them on the issue of the russian investigation. Already calls for already calla special independent investigation to be set up in the wake of this firing. Democratic senators [no audio] so, it is very difficult what to understand based on conduct that was known both in october and earlier in the year and given the chance on the administration change, you didnt take that opportunity. Murphy with the latest developments out of washington. For more on how markets have been taking the news, lets get to mark cudmore live from singapore. Screaming this is shocking, outrageous and bizarre. The asian equities session very much took this in their stride. The european equities session looks to be a little weaker. It hasas been very been a holiday in certain countries including singapore. What is happening now is the market is very divided. The negative skew is this is highlighting trumps ability to surprise and shock and that is worrying at a time when north korea is flaring up again. His ability to make a describes surprising decision. It undermines his authority to get stimulus through and overall credibility. The positive skew is we have gotten used to trumps surprising. Fiscal stimulus is already very low so it cant fall too much lower. People, what a lot of are saying, earnings are good and that dominates everything on the political side so it doesnt matter. Manus ive never heard a market commentator say finally there is nothing more to say. He is also questioning the strength of the recovery marked dollar down for the first time in three days. A bit of a shake . Dollar didnk the fall on this initial news. There has been dollaryen pull back and we have seen signs of that. The june hike is largely priced in. It is where the fed goes from there. Sustainedot the inflation people wanted and with Commodity Prices going local or, it is lower it is unlikely inflation will go back. We have not seen Wage Inflation that was expected to come through. At the moment, while we are expecting another hike soon, another hike later this year or next year, we are not expecting a sustained hiking style cycle we expected months ago. Anna thank you, mark cudmore. You can follow on the bloomberg using the mliv function. Lets turn our detent attention to the Global Growth story in china. Manus Producer Prices slowed more than expected in april, signs of potential easing of global reflation. John is here, the head of u. K. Rates and strategy at ubs. Whatpi didnt what do it was supposed to do. The highest reading in eight years from february. Pick aoo soon to un story we got so bullish over. Today, a bit of a blitz and everybody wants deposit. It is over. John shows how much focus has been on the reflation story. It is only one number and Producer Prices are filed a tile volatile everywhere. I wouldnt overplay it but it happened to the oil prices as well. Thee are reasons to think strength of the story about global reflation is being recalibrated slightly. I wouldnt overplay one number, but you can see why there is a focus on this. From here, i think we think things study a little bit but this is a warning that all may not be as people hope. Anna things are pretty calm at the moment in chinese currency markets. Things dont look calm in commodities. Weve talked about how weakness in commodities and something worrying about china. So much focus on western european assets. Do you see the china story something still in 2017 could come back to bite us as it has done in the past . Always a possibility because of the rising importance of china in recent years and for that matter, so is the way the u. S. Recovery revolves. In the First Quarter, the assumption was it was temporary and the outlook for europe and the eurozone looks reasonably benign. But clearly, if the larger tobal economies start stumble relative to expectations there will be consequences elsewhere as well. For now, the eurozone looks to androm strength to strength on a relatively benign view elsewhere we see that continuing. When we were doing the risk radar, we talked dollar and it being better off. Questioned the ability of the u. S. At the trajectory of the recovery. Europe is powering ahead, china, question mark. Back, hasway and come it changed or is it a messier version of what you left hind . John our outlook hasnt changed. Ais is never going to be smooth path everywhere towards a stronger more stable global economy. As we have been moving in that direction, certainly in the case of the u. S. And potentially in the nottoodistant future, the accommodation that has been in place for the best part of the decade is very slowly being unwound. That is a very dangerous process and as we go down that path, the worries worry is that the Central Banks may be moving at a pace inappropriate will remain in the background and any signs of the week First Quarter in the u. S. May be signs that the global reflation momentum is fading a little bit, you will get markets being concerned. Anna we talked to erin britain and when we talked about the eurozone, he talked about draghi unwinding the level of stimulus hes putting into the economy at the moment. Do you think it is premature to be talking about unwinding qe . N it is unexpected premature to do it unexpectedly, but the changes could be as soon as the next conference, june, and they will set out some path to tapering in september and begin early next year. It is a very gradual process and than most,e, more has gone through tribulations so asy will tread lightly underlying inflation pressure is benign and they want to be very sure they are not prematurely. And we just learned from one extensional lurch from one existential crisis to the other. Anna thank you so much, john. Head of rate strategy at ubs. 7 8 and in london. Europes ask a secondlargest insurer is planning the to return money to shareholders. It reaffirmed its 2020 Profit Company would take of 2018,he first part helping speed up the achievement of the companys 2020 goal. Apples 10year rally since the arrival of the iphone now sees it become the First Company worth more than 800 billion dollars. Shares have continued to rise even as the firm reports slowing sales of its device. They are climbed 33 this year, adding 185 billion in market count. Walmart is preparing to pay around 300 million to resolve a long running u. S. Investigation into alleged bribery. The people said the deal was steal beer still being finalized and could change. But it was a concession by the department of justice which has socked twice that amount as recently last year. Walmart declined to comment. That is your Bloomberg Business flash. Manus thank you very much. , First Quarterts revenues 50. 9 billion euros in line with expectations. Third set of results since the merger and the supermarket said it is on track to deliver fullyear net 220 million euros. The ceo joins us. Great to have you with us this morning. Well done on your numbers. And i speak. You see rick inflation returning . There is a line you used, you talk about fierce competition. Me competition, for every retailer where we are in the world, you always have competition and clearly, it was a deflation environment and you of course see that more eminent have seen that imminent have seen that. If you look at our resilient sales numbers, we have done during very well in this quarter. If you look at america where we still have comparable volume growth around 1. 8, we are doing well in this market. Think that is a positive note. In europe, opposition is as it was and is, we see some 2 . Ation between 1 and lets say competition clearly on the u. S. Side and i mentioned that is something we have been offsetting well with our strategy. Anna just to dive more into that comment tree on the u. S. And the competitive environment. How much Pricing Power do you have there in the u. S. And you stick with your comment that u. S. Reflation would return in the second half of this year . Ahold delhazie we expect that because most deflation we expect from commodities. Milk, pork, meat. There is a lot of commodities where we have seen this environment since the middle of 2013 and that is why we are cycling that out and expected to come back. We have seen it till the end of the quarter a bit. We have already seen the deflation environment coming down and up in a way. Believe that it is not only and i want to stress that there has certainly been discussion in the second half of last year were some of our competitors who are setting up and reducing product prices, investinue to this and improve our price positioning and perception in the market. We are able to do that. Also supported by in this this and it is our delivering us he bids. Certain things we used offset inflationary environment are delivering this synergy to the bottom line and that is good news. Manus just on those synergies, First Quarter 66 million euros, the target stands at 220 million euros. What about shareholder returns . Well, cutting costs in the business, competing in a very competitive landscape, but where are you in the news flow from the shareholder for the shareholder and giving them hope in upping the returns . Dick clearly what our clear policy is 40 to 50 dividend on to net earnings. We are running a Share Buyback program of a billion again for this year. Our shareholders will see the benefits in the continuum of a good return on their shares. Necessary tois grow sales and improve our margins with the synergy the neighboring so we can keep our promise and that is what i mentioned in the outlook for this year. We expect on the performance of 2016 to see an increase. Anna vick, you clearly operated a number of different markets. In europe, we have seemed to laid behind us at the moment some of the more heated rhetoric about the future of the euro, for example around the dutch election, the french election, how concerned are you about populism and the threat to the euro . Is that something that gets into boardroom conversations at ahold delhazie . Dick everyone is following it. If you are in the dutch market, and we are a big part of europe also with our business. We of course are looking at developments. We are pleased with the way the of theuarter results elections of the netherlands, the recent election in france, are supporting the fact that europe needs to step up and needs to understand themselves. I think we do now, that we need to work on a more united economy in europe. Europeat means we in think that we are stepping up on the european side from an economy point of view. This market is a 500 people market in the eurozone. It is an enormous opportunity for business to strengthen that, if we are able also to use the european zone with more open borders and less protection, i think that is what is necessary for european markets to grow. Manus vick, thank you for the update. The ceo of ahold delhazie. Stocks are set for a slightly weaker open. Seems to be a tepid response thus far to Donald Trumps firing of comey. Anna play catch up with what happened on u. S. Markets. Market open is next. This is bloomberg. Manus it is Bloomberg Markets the european open where we bring you the first trade of the day. I am manus cranny with matt miller and here is what we are watching. Director trump fired comey amid an investigation into russian meddling in the election. Trump said the bureau needs new leadership to restore public restoreonfidence public trust. The