hundred points around three percent three percent of the total across the sea of japan things were much better in china as the shanghai composite index which has been a bit on a bit of a rocky trend over the past few days took a tumble of more than one hundred points which for this index is quite a bit markets in europe also felt the heat but not nearly as much with the german dax taking a bit of a slide but was trending upward toward the end of trading the u.k. footsie was also down today with a bevy of uncertain moves and clued in the country's brics it saga drama and finally the dow jones in new york was also hit by the downturn opening in the red but over trading today it has managed to bounce back a bit. the u.s. federal housing administration the f.h.a. has notified lenders that it will change its standards and begin rating some home loans more home loans as risky the new policy could significantly affect the size and composition of f.h.a. is one point three trillion dollar loan portfolio and f.h.a.

is mission of making homeownership more feasible for those with less than ideal credit ratings and an f.h.a. f.h. a spokesperson told the wall street journal the roughly five percent of his portfolio of first time borrowers could be affected resulting in forty thousand to fifty thousand more mortgages being labeled as to risky for f.h.a. to underwrite the average credit rating for an approved f.h.a. borrower is six seventy the shift by f.h.a. reverse is a relaxation of lending ratings in two thousand and sixteen and is a response in parts of the entry of a growing number of non non-bank lenders to the home loan market. and across the atlantic the british public are trying to force their way on to the stage of the bronx a drama on saturday a parade us estimated at more than a million marchers demanding a second national. vote on whether to leave the european union filled the streets

of london a petition on parliament to parliament calling for cancellation of brigs it now has well over five million signatures the options of a second referendum or cancellation are much like a no deal burks it ideas the british political class has almost unanimously declared unthinkable but they still seem to become more possible by the day and sometimes by that hour meanwhile u.k. prime minister to resign many has put some nordic sorely needed time on the clock ms may has now extracted an agreement for a short delay of the braggs it to april twelfth if members of parliament approved the twice rejected agreement and a third vote planned for next week if the agreement is not passed the e.u. has further agreed that brags it will be delayed for a longer period until may twenty second opposition leader jeremy corbyn also weighed in on the prime minister's burks a plan over the weekend. now. seems as if. we

should go to the bottom ten it's all going to come around. this is a change. and moving from britain just across the english channel over to france protesters took to the streets yet again for another week in a protest under the banner banner of the yellow vest movement but this past weekend was unique in that french president emmanuel mccrone has deployed new measures to combat the protesters artie's medina coaching to nova brings us up to speed with the latest on the ground from paris following harsh measures centering by the french government twelve point and other wave of extreme right saying here in paris the nineteenth consecutive weekends of demonstrations went rather peaceful here and they kept us out over eight thousand people marched across the city center and this sound on the steps of the famous that recur cathedral which is located all right and then north of the cow. but so it was

a new location for the yellow fasts demonstration that's for the french government well it's close several landmarks that used to be the meeting points for protesters including the avenue. and surrounding areas which saw the highest level of violence recent weekends the government imposed half the fines for those who violate thing you said oh frank relations says he was also beefed up with security the french government decided to deploy armed soldiers on the streets who had the right to open fire and the life opinion polls on the presidency of a million mccraw and has been regularly conducted by french pollsters since the start of his five year term pool was conducted that showed that three quarters of the frame is sharp dissatisfied with the president and then across policies and how his cabinet is handling the protests movements in the country as for the situation on the european stock markets well they deep into losses at the end of last week

closing near a session lows paris were saying more than two percent on this monday it's full continuance overall this weekend when other peaceful in regards to yellow vest protests but they say that the movement will go on. moving elsewhere in the euro zone in the midst of simmering tensions between the u.s. and western powers in china italy turn up the heat over the weekend by officially joining the asian superpowers bolton wrote in the move cements italy is the first g seven nation to sign on to the initiative despite fierce resistance from the united states and partners in the european union china however has refuted concerns from western powers they see that italy's move will be an all round benefit for the struggling mediterranean nation as government spokespeople attempted to tamp down western concerns. for the train in italy have great speed to cooperate. in

expanding trade investment in infrastructure construction finance health tourism and other fields belt road initiative is open and transparent we welcome more countries to carry forward the spirit of silk road and to build built in road together it will achieve common development and bring benefit to relevant countries and people the so-called fears of individual countries are completely unnecessary. so help us get a global perspective on the issue and guide us through the world words we're now joined by our correspondent alex mchale inch alex welcome back. thank you alex tell me a bit about the belgian wrote an initiative or b r i we talk a lot about it here on the show but for those who somehow haven't heard about it yet tell us about the. break that down for you just after i tell you that you know with the italy this is a big move for them twenty nine agreements signed over the weekend during president she's visit to italy and this amounts to about two point eight billion dollars investment so of course italy was excited to jump on board especially when you

start off with a bonus surprise like this but out let's talk about the belt and wrote initially here's a map this should give us a good view of what this looks like we're talking about sixty percent of the population of the globe already pretty much signed on to this thing. it's china centered business network basically right so the trading that work that is center is centered around china we're talking about the old silk road from ages ago and this is the basis of this but you have the two parts to it which is the salt silk road economic belt which is on the ground and then what they call like to call the maritime silk road which is the maritime so wherever the boats go so this is attaches bunch of eurasia when i'm speaking about eurasia going down all the way to oceana and that all the way to western europe now italy of course plays a massive part in all of this this is a focus on infrastructures of focus on manufacturing materials construction railways and so there's a lot being done here we're talking about a trillion plus dollars in investment on the behalf of china to make this happen so

break it down to italy itself and this is why the good thing for them right now they have two main goals here and when you have a group like this side while you're basically killing these two birds with one stone they want the deficit between trade with them in china to be lowered which means they can export more to china which is a huge one and also they want some infrastructure help so that would be the chinese bank the big one beijing based asian infrastructure investment bank so they're giving money towards these types of projects and these types of projects will be happening in italy in that great rundown. alex and we can see why what the angles are for italy why they would want to be part of the b r i as far as the people that are not so happy about the parties that are not so happy about this the e.u. and the united states how are they reacting to this announcement now that is italy's actually gone through with this partnership i mean the u.s. doesn't like this at all we see china as a nation growing in extending its power across all the continents basically now there's a huge huge partnerships with this project that are in pakistan that are in sri

lanka and they are moving into europe so never mind for the positive all the way from trying to what would be western europe over russia in terms of say kazakhstan all the serbia and all those countries that are in between the two so for the u.s. this is a strategic thing really and what they're saying that they're calling this debt trap diplomacy they're saying that the chinese are coming in with money and putting nations into debt and when you look at a country like sri lanka or pakistan yes these are countries that are doing too well economically so keeping them in by giving a bit of that debt that could be a part of it a debt trap diplomacy i don't know if we should be actually pushing it that far now what comes the e.u. is the fracturing of the e.u. because not everybody is signing up to this thing and we don't have all the countries united to sign up that's an issue so the e.u. loses a little bit of its negotiating powers with china if it's a divided e.u. . very interesting alex very interesting situation i'm sure it's only going to get more interesting and complicated as time goes on and you'll be here to break down the next developments our team correspondent alex male that's thanks for being with

us and you keep. coming back to the shores of the united states we had on a story we reported on last week we told you how biogen the biotech company announced they would halt work on theirs their touted all timers cured drug shortly after that announcement the company's stock completely bottomed out now look at this massive drop here around thirty percent well now the company has announced that it will be using five billion dollars to buy back their own stock following this. but company stock recovered slightly on the news but compared to last week's massive stop. drop this looks just like a drop in the bucket at this point in time now for a quick break but hang in there because when we return after the fallout for venezuela from american sanctions oil buyers are looking elsewhere. through the oil moves in the gulf of mexico and elsewhere. only just how real is the prospect of the i. sat down with you. in hong kong.

and so much more as you go to play here are the numbers at the end. so what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have. let it be an arms race. only. i don't see how. you sit down. the problem in venezuela is not that socialism has been. different.

but. the. henry kissinger. terms of economic and social system could take hold and therefore the policy would be to make. the economy scream. this manufacture can be sent to the public well. when the ruling classes protect themselves. in the final merry go round.

we can all middle of the room. you know world of big part of the law and conspiracy it's time to wake up to dig deeper to hit the stories that mainstream media refuses to tell more than ever we need to be smart we need to stop critical thinking it's time to fight for the middle for the truth the time is now we're watching closely watching the hawks. welcome back fame us in peril european union's competition commission over the company's attempts to prevent cross border sales of licensed products bearing the

brands of some of europe's biggest soccer clubs the commission says that seems involved or a us role not f.c. barcelona inter milan given to spain just united and manchester united as well as the french football federation in a statement competition commissioner margret a vestibular said nike prevented many of its licensees from selling these branded products in a different country leading to less choice and higher prices for consumers nike stock which has been on a direct down trend for the past few five days including a dip on friday after an unfavorable profit was trying to offer not. it will profit advisory but earlier today the nikkei stock was trading up after the news. and the dwindling oil production and lingering political crisis in venezuela continue to shift oil markets as boom busters no venezuela's oil exports are predominantly heavy crude and venezuelan producers typically expect to ship their product to u.s.

refineries designed to handle that chemical and put reuters points out that crude oil accounts for two thirds of us of oil imports and venezuela accounts for a disproportionately large portion of that sector at thirteen percent of heavy crude imports to the u.s. rival producers in the gulf of mexico as well as oil energy majors royal dutch shell and british petroleum are now profiting from resulting shifts in oil production distribution. and joining us to break down all the moves in the gulf and the turmoil in venezuela is marine catoosa of catoosa research it's good to say welcome to the show. my pleasure now first of all when oil production in minutes way though when you see a decline start as stark as sharp as we have in recent years what is the effect on oil markets in terms of light crude versus heavy locations of production and these and these refineries that we talked about. so if you look at the venezuela production you know from the peak is about just under just slightly above two point

three million barrels a day they're down about forty two percent to date and a lot of that is not reinvesting into their fields at the same time as the refineries adjust their composition mix because of the success of the domestic shale areas such as canada has really made up the difference from the the lack of production from the traditionally heavy your oil fields from mexico and venezuela so you're seeing a major transition where now the u.s. refineries you know this undesirable or lower valued heavy oil is now becoming very desirable and and what has been the role in this scenario of u.s. sanctions in relation to a venezuela is building to sell their oil in abroad and raise needed foreign exchange and has there been an effect from those sanctions downstream on production . i'm going to give you a very unpopular and a contrarian perspective i actually don't think the sanctions have made that big of

a difference because before the sanctions even came in the actual venezuelan production saw it's a big hit down on the negative side so if you look what happened to russia in the eighty's or mexico in the late ninety's early two thousand same thing when the state all nations do not invest in their own production but use those to fund the socialist agenda in you know non production the fields have a natural. decline that is exactly what's going on in venezuela right now yet still today they unfortunately it's not just the oil production it's the venezuelan refineries are actually running at you know you're looking at over a decade low so they're not running at a high utilization rate so they are importing crude actually and if you look at the ones that they're working with it's russia through lukoil obviously you've got china and also india so you know has it been easy to know but are there ways to work around the sanctions definitely yeah we're always interested to get a contrarian take and we will take that your take up with next time we have

a venezuela guest on it as well expert next time but switching to the oil play are sort of the oil sector players here shell and b.p. have been cited in this report as some of the stakeholders what is their position in this scenario how are they profiting. what you see you can have many juniors come in so this is a very expensive venture they plotted out in decades if oil drops to say forty they won't shut down the production whereas many of the shale fields you would see a decrease in production quickly so when you look at the gulf of mexico it's a very different type of production very different decline rates and it's a very baseline production that the majors are looking at for multi-year production it's much more expensive also so it's a very different type of production i don't think this is in reflection to venezuela specifically i know there's been references made but it's more of a business venture for the majors ok so it's just trying to it's happening more

broadly separate from what's happening in venezuela currently. exactly because look at the canadian production what a lot of people are making that connection is where the big smart lot of the large u.s. funds and some of the largest like riverstone are investing billions of dollars in canada because of the heavy oil that is been reduced from mexico and venezuela is being produced even more in kind of the problem. good point there don't sleep on canada when you think about oil markets could use a chairman of the research thanks for your time. but. when we think about the future for decades we have thought about flying cars and robots taking care of our dull chores but what about a future without cash although chain is still in its infancy some people think it could lead to a cashless revolution r.t. producer brant borg managed to catch up with. you know that in hong kong where he first asked how botching has managed to play into traditional investing. so in two

ways f.e one way is actually really internally so one of our major problems early stage and even late stage funds has been lack of liquidity so one thing that we are doing is to actually create a small contract so that peace can buy and sell their interest to a small contract which means that the small lake which we have. in the old days which is still now you know normally fun could take even ten than even more years so there is the potential to get acquitted you know years of that is really affecting us internally externally what you are mentioning is where do we position ourselves we only invest into equity we are trying to really understand this security token landscape is that something we could invest through into or not and that is something that is happening right now in really trying to understand where we should position us and you being from the traditional investment background i mean so you're working in what stocks bonds had fun things like that well i did

start an internet fan a long time ago when i back in france which was one of the first internet banks we check should be. served its clients revolved any back branches and we survived we had to be under fifty thousand clients three hundred fifty people served them and twelve years profit before we sold it to c.i.c. and ever since then i've been basically doing all the stage investments and mainly payments to start with and i was very very. lucky as you might have heard that i had these three axes in ten days two thousand and thirteen and i got these toward angel of the year in europe and then i moved to a show in two thousand and fourteen because especially payments i believe and still believe that this is where sap an interest payments it's not in europe and it's not the us it's here. why is that why is this the place mainly has been driven by china which had an alley pay where to go you know straight to cure code payments they go straight into leap frogging technology instead of building it on our credit cards in our way the way we do so there is this leapfrogging mentality that i think is

very very strong in a shop you know we've seen this before in some european nations as well a kind of move to a fully cashless society. is that good or bad so i'm actually coming from one of those countries sweden which is actually almost a fully cashless society since two thousand i reduced cash by fifty percent definitely think it's good for the states because they know where the cash is so it means that you have pay your taxes no matter if you see a stevie eighty or you name it so it's getting paid so that's one thing which is very good that you actually can from a you know from a state point of view tax gets paid from a monetary policy point of view i think it's also important because you can track. we can track where the cash movements and that's where because it's digitized and that's where i see huge use the cases for actually decentralized technology from a central bank point of view that they can fine tune their money supply and demand mechanist food additionally to ledgers does the cashless yes it's definitely

important i think the biggest threat to a cashless society has traditionally been the czechs you have them in the u.s. you have them in the u.k. you have them in singapore you have them in france and the problem there has really been government policy checks are for free they will continue to be used if cash checks are charged and you know you need to pay something to use a very expensive. you know monetary system to put you make your payments then people use it less that's what sweden actually did already thirty years ago that costs are equal to five dollars to use a check and that's why it's gone into cash to society very quickly so i think government policy actually makes a difference and interest if you want to go to cash to society and the next level of a cash to society for me is the block to society so so government can make a decision does it concern you not to sound a little conspiratorial you know you like you say everything can be tracked or do i want every financial transaction i make actually being tracked. well you know then

you have you know we don't would you say we shouldn't go into iraq jane but you know certainly if it can also keep privacy there which you know we can discuss anywhere on the block chain you can keep the privacy really some solutions you can write so that's where the way comes as long as you can keep the privacy of their yes i think you know we should keep track of our cash movements but the question is the privacy of each a how or how on a permission based can we actually you know at the same time keep privacy and also keep track of the cash and for that we need to have trust and that's where it is to be to educate see and to death trust is who is running it. so it's all kind of linked to each other in a high society in a high trust society like sweden we trust what our government does and we give data but we are also know that they called police used the data from privacy policies so it all depends also on government policy on state policy on policy who do you want

to share your data with and how does the block trade end up playing into the idea of a cashless society well i mean it's all these permission based you know distributed ledgers how do you use them you know as you know there are many different ways some of they're really to protect privacy as much as possible like one arrow like c cash they are maybe at that forefront and you have. that maybe don't desire for privacy at all so you have a big spectrum between different solutions of distance which technology as you know the probably defeat if it's completely anonymous is that down and you don't contract who is down what but you can just track the overall numbers is that something gets traded that shouldn't be traded for is this illegal goods of so on so there's a balance between you know how much can be tracked and when and actually keeping the privacy and actually at the same time having that the benefits of tracking the

cash. that's it for this time you can yet catch boom bust on youtube dot com slash will most r.t. . officer. to get up off the ground began to. hurt them focus on the sounds of the new grown man mislead essentially. a visual push to do away from the office or. the obvious or did they kind of lunge for the web in one smiths and then when it happened on trace one as observations didn't i never saw any contact between the two any kind went back to where they were so the answer is back here they're going again fifteen feet apart

at this point and that's when the officer pulled his gun and even beyond three. join me every week on the alex i'm unsure when i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. the money blossoming is dead right so the money velocity would measure of how money is being along down from bank to bank to bank bank bank which is a measure of economic health is dead and if the money printing continues to increase printing more of the. focus is going on the phone lines small fighting only coming suddenly made in the

moment come on the supreme court appointments to november done so because he doesn't get a. lot of muslims in the fall but he did just that he had a woman. she was human. jungle bar from the sun on my book you go to the british of course they're going up i've been brought up. i mean you got. to. take a. look

at what. the tough. i have the exchange of fire between israel and god's all monday night off to hamas and broken ceasefire. it comes as the u.s. officially recognizes israeli sovereignty over syria's golan heights a move that's been condemned by the when the e.u. and the arab league.