The Brexit Day That Wasn’t.

From Bloomberg’s Brexit Bulletin:

Britain should have been waking up this morning to its last day as a member of the European Union after 46 years.

Instead, through a combination of political missteps, indecisiveness and confusion, March 29 has arrived with the country still not knowing whether it will leave next month, the month after, next year or not at all. Nor on what terms.

Today’s date had been set in stone for so long. Theresa May – after taking office but before calling an unnecessary general election – triggered Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, the EU’s exit clause, two years ago today. Loud voices in the U.K. and the EU were pressuring her to do so, but many now believe she did it too early…

Perhaps May will, against the odds, get her deal passed in Parliament today. But if not, European governments are divided over whether the U.K. should leave without a deal or stay in for a long time.

Only one thing is for sure: No one knows what will happen next.

Programming note: Parliament votes today at 2:30pm London time, 10:30am ET.

The Latest:
-Theresa May Gambles on Last-Ditch Vote to Avoid Long Brexit Delay (Bloomberg)
-What Parliament Is Voting On — and Why It Isn’t the Whole Deal (Bloomberg)
-Britain Left Counting the Cost of Brexit (Bloomberg)

Trade Watch:
-China, U.S. Said to Pore Over Details of Text to End Trade War (Bloomberg)
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer held meetings in Beijing Friday partly to ensure there were no discrepancies in the English and Chinese-language versions of the text, and also to balance the number of working visits to each capital, according to the officials, who asked not to be identified because the talks aren’t public. Chinese Vice Premier Liu He is due in Washington next week.
-Trump’s North American Trade Deal at Risk of Stalling in Congress (Washington Post)

Today in Washington: Mueller Report is 300 Pages, Raising Questions About AG William Barr’s Four-Page Summary (New York Times)

Finance Today: The ETF Tax Dodge Is Wall Street’s “Dirty Little Secret” (Bloomberg)

IPO Watch: Today’s Lyft Trading Debut to Be Watched by IPO-Hungry Tech Companies (Bloomberg)

Education Today:
-For an Edge in Ivy League Admissions, Grab an Oar and Row (Bloomberg)
Crew, other sports can give students a leg up when applying.
-At $50,000-a-Year, The Road to Yale Starts at Age 5 in New York (Bloomberg)
The college cheating scandal confirms what affluent New Yorkers have known all along.

Health Today: How Evidence Has Fueled Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Work In Tobacco Control (Health Affairs – Dr. Kelly Henning and Jennifer Ellis)

Arts Weekend: Get a Striking View of Earth from Space New York’s Lower East Side (Time Out New York)

Travel Alert: The World’s Ten Best Airports – No U.S. Airports Make the Cut (Bloomberg)
Singapore’s Changi is the planet’s best airport for the seventh straight year. The rankings: 1) Singapore Changi; 2) Haneda, Tokyo; 3) Incheon, Seoul; 4) Hamad, Doha; 5) Hong Kong; 6) Chabu Nentrair, Najoya; 7) Munich; 8) London Heathrow; 9) Narita, Tokyo; 10) Zurich.

Best of late night.

On the U.S. college admissions cheating scandal and reports that some schools were considering expelling students who had benefited from their parents’ bribes:

“It doesn’t really matter if the kids didn’t know their parents bribed their way in, the point is they got into the school under false pretenses. I mean, if Tinder puts Chris Hemsworth’s photo on your profile, people are going to swipe right, but you can’t blame your matches when they bail out of the date.”
— Trevor Noah

“After being pulled over by the police, a man in South Carolina attempted to cover the smell of alcohol on his breath by spraying his mouth with Axe body spray. And you thought the worst thing you could do with Axe body spray was put it on your body!”
— James Corden

On Brexit:

“To be honest we shouldn’t be surprised that the British are taking this long to leave Europe, I mean they’re not good at leaving anything; pubs, colonies, you name it.”
— Trevor Noah