|
 In a wild week for government debt, German Bunds posted their worst
weekly losses since the euro's inception in 1999, spurred by a
revised upward inflation forecast by the European Central Bank and
blunt comments by ECB President Mario Draghi.
Uncertainty over Greece's debt obligations weighed on sentiment in
Europe, but the surprisingly strong U.S. labor market report for May
pared European equity losses and led Wall Street to close mixed near
break-even.
U.S. nonfarm payrolls jumped 280,000 last month, the largest gain
since December, while payrolls for March and April were revised to
show 32,000 more jobs were created than previously reported, the
Labor Department said.
The surge in jobs growth, coupled with a gain in average hourly
earnings, led traders to move their bets on when the Fed will start
to raise rates to as soon as October.
"Clearly jobs are being created at a very robust rate, and there's a
rise in hourly pay. There is some sort of wind gathering there,"
said Wilmer Stith, a fixed income portfolio manager at Wilmington
Trust in Baltimore.
U.S. benchmark Treasury debt yields jumped to their highest since
October, while yields on two-year notes hit a more than four-year
peak and five-year yields touched a six-month high.
The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note fell 26/32 in price to
yield 2.4022 percent. Earlier they touched an eight-month peak of
2.442 percent.
German 10-year yields, the benchmark for euro zone borrowing costs,
were higher at 0.85 percent. The widely watched 10-year shed almost
3 percent of its value this week, the biggest weekly loss since the
euro's inception in 1999.
MSCI's all-country world stock index <.MIWD00000PUS> fell 0.78
percent, while the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index <.FTEU3>
closed down 0.88 percent to 1,543.56.
[to top of second column] |
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> fell 56.12
points, or 0.31 percent, to 17,849.46. The S&P 500 <.SPX> slid 3.01
points, or 0.14 percent, to 2,092.83 and the Nasdaq Composite
<.IXIC> added 9.33 points, or 0.18 percent, to 5,068.46.
For the week, the Dow fell 0.9 percent, the S&P 500 fell 0.7 percent
and the Nasdaq was flat.
The dollar rallied to a 13-year peak against the yen and rose
sharply against the euro on the accelerating U.S. job growth.
The dollar rose more than 1 percent against the euro, yen, and Swiss
franc. The greenback hit 125.850 yen, while the euro turned sharply
lower after rallying earlier this week.
The euro was last down 1.12 percent against the dollar at $1.1111.
The dollar was last up 1.02 percent against the yen at 125.63 yen.
Greece delayed repayment of an IMF loan on Friday and a deputy
minister said Athens might call snap elections to break an impasse
with lenders.
Oil traded near break-even in volatile trade, with Brent briefly
hitting seven-week lows before paring losses. The surging dollar and
an OPEC decision not to cut output in an oversupplied market sent
crude prices on a roller-coaster ride.Brent settled $1.28 higher at
$63.31 a barrel, after tumbling to an April 16 low of $60.94 a
barrel. U.S. crude <CLc1> rose $1.13 to settle at $59.13 a barrel.
(Reporting by Herbert Lash; Editing by Nick Zieminski)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
