Connect with us
Finance Digest is a leading online platform for finance and business news, providing insights on banking, finance, technology, investing,trading, insurance, fintech, and more. The platform covers a diverse range of topics, including banking, insurance, investment, wealth management, fintech, and regulatory issues. The website publishes news, press releases, opinion and advertorials on various financial organizations, products and services which are commissioned from various Companies, Organizations, PR agencies, Bloggers etc. These commissioned articles are commercial in nature. This is not to be considered as financial advice and should be considered only for information purposes. It does not reflect the views or opinion of our website and is not to be considered an endorsement or a recommendation. We cannot guarantee the accuracy or applicability of any information provided with respect to your individual or personal circumstances. Please seek Professional advice from a qualified professional before making any financial decisions. We link to various third-party websites, affiliate sales networks, and to our advertising partners websites. When you view or click on certain links available on our articles, our partners may compensate us for displaying the content to you or make a purchase or fill a form. This will not incur any additional charges to you. To make things simpler for you to identity or distinguish advertised or sponsored articles or links, you may consider all articles or links hosted on our site as a commercial article placement. We will not be responsible for any loss you may suffer as a result of any omission or inaccuracy on the website.

NEWS

World shares rise, U.S. yield curve inverts after strong jobs data

Published On :

By Carolyn Cohn

LONDON (Reuters) – World shares bounced and government bond yields resumed their upward climb on Friday on signs of persistent prices pressures, while oil was poised for a 13% weekly fall following reserve releases.

U.S. data released early Friday showed employers added 431,000 jobs in March and the unemployment rate fell to 3.6%, continuing a strong run of hiring that has left key aspects of the U.S. labor market “little different” from where they were before the pandemic.

With U.S. economic growth so robust and inflation running at three times the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, investors are widely expecting a drum roll of interest rate rises this year.

Treasury yields, which retreated earlier this week as portfolio adjustments boosted demand for bonds, spiked again on Friday, causing a closely watched part of the yield curve to invert for the third time this week.

An inversion of the yield curve, when shorter-dated yields rise above longer-dated ones, are seen as a harbinger of a recession in the next one or two years.

Today’s solid growth of payrolls checked the box for the Fed in its drive toward fighting inflation,” said Rick Rieder, BlackRock’s Chief Investment Officer of Global Fixed Income.

Consequently, the Fed looks clearly undeterred in reaching at least policy neutrality and probably will do at least one, and maybe two 50-basis-point rate hikes by the June … meeting, which could even include an inter-meeting hike.”

But bets that aggressive monetary tightening could be on the cards did not drag equity markets lower on Friday.

By late morning in New York, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed, the S&P 500 rose 0.11%, and the Nasdaq Composite added 0.28%.

The pan-European STOXX 600 index rose 0.62% and MSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe gained 0.05%.

Inflation in Europe is also running at record levels, with Euro zone inflation hitting 7.5% in March, data showed on Friday, another all-time high with months left before it is set to peak, raising pressure on the European Central Bank to act to contain prices even as growth slows sharply.

In response, the German 10-year government bond yield, a benchmark for the euro zone, rose 2.8 bps to 0.58%, after jumping 39 bps in March, its biggest monthly rise since 2009. [GVD/EUR]

Government bond yields have moved up markedly in recent weeks and can be expected to trend higher over time due to inflationary pressures that are here to stay and responses by the main central banks,” said Christian Nolting, Global Chief Investment Officer at Deutsche Bank Private Bank in a note.

Two-year Treasury yields jumped to 2.4523% from 2.284%, surpassing benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yields, which also rose to 2.3932% from 2.325%. [US/]

In Tokyo, the Nikkei was down 0.56%, notching up a 1.7% weekly fall.

Supply disruption and surging raw material costs drove Japanese business confidence to a nine-month low last quarter.

Chinese blue chips rose 1.27%, helped by hopes for policy easing. [.HK]

Oil dipped in and out of negative territory ahead of a meeting of International Energy Agency member nations set to discuss a release of emergency oil reserves alongside a huge planned release by the United States.

Oil is on course for a 12%-13% weekly fall – the sharpest in almost two years, after an earlier surge driven by the Ukraine conflict had seen prices rise by more than 30%. [O/R]

U.S. crude rose 0.23% to $100.51 per barrel and Brent was at $105.64, up 0.89% on the day.

The dollar has benefited from safe-haven flows and expectations of rising U.S. rates. Against a basket of peers, the greenback was up 0.34% at 98.647, and it was up 0.87% against the yen at 122.81. [FRX/]

The euro was down slightly at $1.1040.

Safe-haven gold fell 0.59% after its biggest quarterly gain in two years. Spot gold was last quoted at $1,928.01 per ounce. [GOL/]

(Additional reporting by Andrew Galbraith in Shanghai, Tom Westbrook in Singapore and Saikat Chatterjee in London; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore, Catherine Evans, Barbara Lewis and Nick Macfie)

Continue Reading

Why pay for news and opinions when you can get them for free?

       Subscribe for free now!


By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: . You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact

Recent Posts