Well, I’m sure most investors will be happy to get the hell out of February and on that score, there’s good news! Odds are, the month will be over on Wednesday. And hell, Trump’s still President last time we checked which means there’s a non-zero chance he fumbles the nuclear football and history stops without warning, so in theory, February could be over tomorrow if he watches the wrong Fox News segment on North Korea.

Anyone have the Colombo All Share on their February market bingo card?

BBG’s Garfield Reynolds: “Indonesia and Sri Lanka are clinging on as the only Asian bourses in the green for this month.”

ok, who had Sri Lanka on their best-performing February market bingo card?

— Walter White (@heisenbergrpt) February 25, 2018

Europe will dominate the event risks in the week ahead. Italy holds closely-watched elections next Sunday and the Five Star Movement is still leading the polls. The results will be mixed – literally, as in a hung parliament. Apparently, Five Star Leader Luigi Di Maio is looking at the possibility of offering a “government contract” to other parties in the event he wins but falls short of a majority. The idea (I guess) is to build a coalition although he doesn’t want to surrender any ministerial seats to anyone who joins his imaginary coalition, so I’m not sure what the incentive is other than to avoid a prolonged period of uncertainty.

“The election will likely reveal little immediately about Italy’s next government [and] even if M5S does eventually form a government, we note that the Italian constitution prohibits referenda on treaty changes and an M5S-led coalition would lack the two-thirds majority needed in parliament to make treaty changes,” Barclays notes, adding that nevertheless, “an M5S-led government would challenge the EU, while its presence on the European Council could make moves towards EU integration more difficult.”