Macron cowers
I can scarcely remember a political star rising and falling as quickly Emmanuel Macron. He momentarily united enough of France to win himself a strong mandate only to squander it. His coup-de-grace has been his handline of the gilets jaunes.
Bloomberg is out with a scathing review of everything he ever stood for.
It took Emmanuel Macron just one speech to ditch his entire strategy for shaking up the euro zone. Upon his election, the French president pledged to respect the monetary union's budget rules to regain credibility with Germany. Fiscal consolidation and structural reforms weren't just a way to strengthen the French economy, they were also the key to unlocking significant reforms of the euro zone - including a shared budget.
Ouch.
But it gets worse. His emergency measures will punch an enormous hole in France's budget and push their 2019 budget above the 3%-of-GDP limit. Those are the same rules that Italy has been drip-tortured with for the past two months.
A fresh structural deficit would be seen in Italy has the height of hypocrisy.
More importantly, Bloomberg goes onto make the point that this will halt any progress on further European integration.