Eight days, getting a little bit of relief. Euro still seeing very strong buying in the treasury markets. You are buying equities, buying commodities, and buying treasuries. Thats what you are seeing into the weekend. Time now for global exchange, where we bring you todays market moving news from around the world, from washington to new york to london. Oil. Gin with the move and crude continuing to climb after its biggest ever single day gain. All trump says he may intervene in the price war between saudi arabia and russia that has rocked crude markets. Here was more is annmarie hordern. Intervene how, and does anyone care . Annmarie it is interesting how exactly he would do this. He said he has some power over the situation, and would get involved at the appropriate time, may be giving riyadh some chance to potentially swamp the world with oil and put the pressure on russia. Then we heard from president Vladimir Putin in an incredible scoop by our moscow bureau. He says they say he is calling what the saudis are doingblack male are blackmail. This plays into the strong persona. One commissioner mentioned potentially texas cutting production. I dont think they are going to do it unless the saudis and russians get on board as well. Alix lets go to washington, where congress and the white house are working to agree on a stimulus package that would help workers, corporations, and small businesses. Joining me from d. C. Is kevin cirilli. What do we know about the bill . Ok, we are going to get back to kevin. We are having some connectivity issues. We are going to go to Michael Mckee. We are going to do a lot of Different Things as we sort everything out on a technical level. A lot of what we have seen over the last few days has to do with centralbank action. What we learned over the last 24 hours . Michael we know that Monetary Policy, if you are making it at midnight, it is a sign of how seriously Central Banks are taking the whole crisis. As the week draws to an end, a record 31 have slashed Interest Rates, and many have called up the crisis playbook. They are buying bonds, and treating buying bonds, intervening in currency markets, setting up lending programs. They set us up for a rebound if and when, someday. Christine lagarde and her ecb colleagues unveiled a 750 billion euro bond buying package , and vowed no limits in their efforts to defend the euro. In london, the bank of england cut its benchmark rate to a record low, and said it would u. K. 00 billion pounds of government bonds. In under a week, the fed has cut its key Interest Rate i more than 100 basis points to near zero, including a near midnight resurrection of a Financing Facility for primary dealers. Policymakers have also set up a string of other programs that make the Major Players in the markets for government bonds, merge back government bonds, mortgagebacked securities, government papers, and mutual funds. Maybe those efforts are having some effect in unclogging the pipes of global finance. Maybe they could set us up for a rebound when this is all over. The problem is nothing they have done so far is having any effect on the virus itself. It is not a vaccine. Alix thank, bloombergs michael thank you very much, bloombergs Michael Mckee. Extra volatility today. It is quadruple witching. Burger joins us. How much worse can it get today . Dani as if markets need another thing to worry about, it certainly could get worse. When you look at the sheer number of options and futures set to expire, a record amount of open interest currently sits on options tied to the s p 500. Of those are set to expire, which would be 1. 5 trillion dollars worth of options. The reason this makes volumes higher in volatility higher, as we get these big swings in markets we have been seeing recently, all of a sudden, an option that was set to expire today could go from profitable to unprofitable. You have these traders either trying to hedge their positions, buying stocks, selling stocks. It could set us up for a volatile day. Coming into the market, however, it does seem a little more calm then we have seen in recent days. Again, the bar is set very high in terms of volatility. This is just markets saying the Central Banks have had a soothing effect on markets, at least for now. You have to remember, we were seeing a big rally last friday, and that obviously did not last. Market watchers are waiting before they declare the all clear, especially as we start to see some of the effects ripple into the real economy. The question now is just how much have markets priced in the damage . Are we going to see a rally from here . If a lot of options are closed out, it could mean that volatility comes down. That is certainly something we will be looking for today. Alix thank you very much. We do want to go to washington, where congress and the white house are working on that stimulus package. Kevin cirilli now with us from d. C. What do we know . Kevin Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell introducing the republican version of the economic stimulus bill, and i am hearing from sources that that means all republicans, or a majority, will get on board for this. Hes also been reaching across the aisle to not only Senate Minority leader chuck schumer, but democrats in the house, led by pelosi, working with the administration on this. The president has said he wants to inject liquidity and at least 1000 to most americans by the first week of april to provide some muchneeded economic relief, and then another round mid april. A lot of moving parts, but based upon my reporting, there will be no significant Political Risk to this not getting passed. Democrats would like to see increases in funding levels, but over the next several days, i think this is definitely going to end up getting passed. Alix thank you for joining us from d. C. One other thing i am watching today, you have mass shut of schools and businesses starting to take a real bite from electricity demand in the biggest u. S. Power markets. On the grade from illinois to new jersey came in 5 lower than forecasted. It is likely only to be getting. In china, Electricity Generation fell the most on record in january and february. And thingsre coal like nuclear. You really cant store natural gas, wind, and solar in the same way, so it will cause a lot of disruptions for agilitys moving into the likes of alternative energy for utilities moving into the likes of alternative energy. Coming up, more on todays markets in todays first take. This is bloomberg. Alix time now for bloomberg first take. Joining me from our inhouse team of wall street veterans and insiders, Michael Mckee, Damian Sassower, and mike mcglone. We made it to friday. Damian, what are you watching today . Whats on your radar . Damian its finally time to say that because currency that cross currency bases are coming in. That is a good sign. Days,20 of the last 21 youve seen Investment Grade u. S. Corporate spreads widen. We are 3. 5 times wider than we were at the beginning of the month. So im still focused on spreads. Obviously, the fundamental backdrop of a lot of these companies have shifted due to covid, but we need to see currency evolve come down in order currency vol come down in order for spreads to react. Alix how would you be thinking about taking on risk or not . Mike last friday, the stockmarket was up about 9 . Knows this virus information is going to get worse. Maybe it peaks with the california shutdown. As the crude oil bottom is, 20 as the alltime high volume price for crude oil futures. The problem is it bounced way too fast. It is probably going to trade in a range come about my Bearish Crude Oil bias is really over. I am going to look back at this week, weve probably had good buying opportunity in u. S. Bonds near 2 . That is pretty good yield resistance. Then a look at the quasis. Gold and bitcoin are very close to being unchanged on the year, despite the dollar being up a percent. The difference up 8 . The difference between those is those have had their reset. Mckee, is fiscal going to save us this weekend . Michael good questions. There are plans in washington. They have to Work Together to try to merge separate ideas of what to do. Then figure out, how is this going to work we want to give cash to people, we want to give loans to small businesses, but how does that actually function . In 2008 when they sent out checks to people, they also did a lot of Electronic Fund transfers. It took about two months to get that money out the door. By that time, this could all be over. Maybe that is the time you want to see the money start to hit the economy, there are going to be plenty of people who say i dont have enough money to get through the next two weeks, let alone two months. Alix does that wind up alleviating some of the upward pressure we have seen on the dollar . Some people are talking about how california shuts down, that is going to be bearish for the dollar. What you think what do you think . Damian all of the commodity currencies, they are all up today. Certainly the high beta currencies are behaving well this morning. About thistalking all. With seven trading days left in the month of march, what i am looking at is last year, the Global Hedge Fund index was up 8. 9 . Weve given it all back this year already. So it is quite scary, with seven trading days left, in order to prevent a lot of these redemptions coming in. In 2008, you had hedge funds down. That meant a lot of redemptions and selling pressure, and that can extend into the summer if we dont see a lot of these managers start to perform well. Alix how much more selling is there left to do . Damian just look at all of the middle east sovereign wealth funds. A lot of them are big investors. Youve got to believe that with oil prices at 20, 25 a barrel, they are going to be giving into some of their excess cash in order to bridge the funding gap. I wouldnt be surprised if you are seeing some redemption pressures and selling pressure on the other side of this. His got guys like bridgewater, millennium youve got guys like bridgewater, millennium that are certainly up in the air. Alix if we have gold find a base, does that mean sovereign wealth funds are recovering a little bit . Mike this is the level from gold to really recover. It got down maybe 3 on the year, and one thing worth mentioning in the dollar, the last time we had the broad dollar up more than 8 on the year was 2008, and that launched the market. Thats what i see happening. Of course, we know with the world needs to do. It needs to flush the system with cash. Theres no more Interest Rate on your savings account, so gold in that environment virtually has to appreciate. Ian one of the most michael one of the most interesting thing is the fed is trying to flood with cash. They keep raising the amount of bonds they are going to buy every day. They are now at 107 billion for today, a record. Are we seeing that cash get into the markets . The feds goal has been to make it so that you can trade, not necessarily that you will trade higher. Is that working . Damian i will let you know when the check arrives in new york because i havent seen it yet. Im just kidding, but truthfully, 2400 per couple, 1200 per individual, checks will be mailed out before the end of this month, i think you are absolutely right. Banks are not into remediating the way they once were. The fund little shift for a lot of the borrowers has changed. So maybe it makes sense to start direct lending to those who need it most. Mike mcglone, a question for you. You mentioned the fact that we are maybe seeing some bottoms coming in. I look back at what happened was equities into thousand eight. They didnt bottom until june 2009, and that is when the recovery started. But the drop has been so fast this time. Are we going to get a quick recovery, or are we decoupled from what is happening in the economy . The move has been so swift in prices. Damian thats the big mike thats the big question. I think everything will depend on when the stock market bottoms. The russell, the smallcap index, has returned to the halfway mark of the big bull market. It is basically at the mean median mode of the last 10 years. The big problem i have is people are measuring it from the peak, which was only a month ago. Youve got to look on a 52 week basis. Is still just a correction. You go down from a 52 week basis at least 30 to 40 , and you stay there a while. This event is pretty much worthy of that. Alix the other part that is not confirming what we are seeing in the ackley market, just the equity market, just to pick the other side of that, is what is happening in equity spreads. Are we going to see even more . We saw so much money come out of ig and go into money market funds. Damian you are absolutely right. Just this month alone, i think we saw a roughly 500 billion dollars go into government money markets, 100 billion come out. You are absolutely right. The fact is with credit, it is an illiquid asset class. It is not just going to snap back, especially with markets behaving dysfunctional he. You20 of the less 21 days, have seen ig spreads widen by 3. 3 times what they were in midfebruary. That is a huge move for what is largely regarded as a relatively safe asset class. I am very focused on spreads. I think weve come a long way in a short order of time. Look at equities. Definitely some room for equities to bounce back here, assuming volatility comes off and markets normalize a bit. Alix guys, really appreciate it. Good luck this weekend. Its been a long week for everybody. Thanks a lot. It reminder, any charts we use throughout the show, go to gtv on your terminal. Browse the features, safety charts. Gtv. This is bloomberg. Turn now to wall street beat to cover three things wall street is buzzing about this morning. Today we are looking at hedge funds. Joining me is sonali basak. Help me. Sonali winners and losers are coming out in pure form. Some people have done very well. Whoan howard, louis bacon, is returning some money to investors. Accra funds have been able to hold up. As we know, bridgewater is one of those that really hadnt through the middle of march. Those who took a more bearish view, no surprise, have done well. Then theres equity longshort. They have had a decline, but some people are really benefiting from betting against stocks that have been really ridden by the coronavirus, so that is a more morbid way to look at this, but really, people are gaining a lot in this market as well. Alix ive read a lot about how risk parody funds in the ityeveraging risk par funds and the deleveraging effort are tied together. Sonali we are really seeing now that the Hedge Fund Industry was very highly leveraged. Theres some risk parody strategies that are having to deliver, and these basis trading strategies that are also really burned because they depended on cost of financing to stay low. 50 times leverage is what we heard in some of these cases. Is question moving forward, the Banking Industry and regulators going to take a look at the Banking System . Alix interesting. To pivot off of that, is that done now . Sonali no. They have been starting to really depended on this leverage to keep on going. Once weaker rates a lot of the fed actions have taken hold, they were able to put some of these trades back on, and you even see some people raising money in these markets. A lot of the fed actions everly helped people keep some of these trades going. So youre not seeing massive deleveraging, but we are seeing some. Alix have we seen funds close . Sonali we are starting to see some funds give back money to investors. There was energy focus fund, for example. Theres carnage in all parts of the markets now, so where do you make money . If you are a smaller fund, you might have a harder time making sure that your bank stays on your side, that youre not getting those margin calls, and that you are able to keep that access to financing. Alix are banks pushing back . Sonali they certainly are. Those margin calls are happening. For some of these funds, they get financing in different ways. Money market funds were a big source of financing for a lot of these hedge funds. Obviously, we saw a lot of pressure in that market. So access to financing from the money market funds might be a little tougher. Alix hopefully the fed is going to help clear that a bit if they provide liquidity for the money markets. Banks have this open line of credit with companies, and High Net Worth individuals, and also hedge funds. How does that work . Sonali wealthy individuals are also certainly getting margin calls. That has become a huge business in recent years, these margin loans. When everything was good, there was not a lot of risk with these trades. While individuals are getting margin calls, private equity firms are getting margin calls also. They have taken out loans confirmed. Ir states but are you sitting here and looking to lend to the hedge funds and institutional investors, or do you need to take care of those companies that really need it . Alix its a really good point. Appreciate that so much, bloombergs sonali basak. Coming up, ian harnett of absolute Strategy Research says the selloff will come in multiple phases. Hes been really is a mystic on the market and bearish for a while. Really pessimistic on the market and bearish for a while. That has paid off after a very turbulent week for equities, the dollar, as well as treasuries. This is bloomberg. Good morning oh no, here comes the neighbor probably to brag about how amazing his Xfinity Customer Service is. Im mike, im so busy. Good thing xfinity has twohour appointment windows. They have night and weekend appointments too. Hes here. Bill . Karolyn . Nope no, just a couple of rocks. Download the my account app to manage your appointments making todays Xfinity Customer Service simple, easy, awesome. Ill pass. Alix this is bloomberg daybreak. In the market, it has been a brutal, unbelievable week, no matter what i set class you are looking at. Its been the best day in years for a lot of markets. Nasdaq fu