President Trump replaces Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson

President Donald Trump has announced today, via Twitter, that he has fired Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. The pair are believed to have disagreed over several foreign policies matters, including the Iran deal, which led Trump to hiring CIA director, Mike Pompeo, as Tillerson’s replacement, who he feels is more like-minded. Despite this news, US stocks opened higher in early trading. This is most likely down to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) data released today which showed that prices rose by 0.2% in February, in line with economists’ expectations. Unlike last month’s figure, which rattled markets, the data released today seemed to reassure US investors that the Federal Reserve would not need to be overly aggressive in raising interest rates this year.