LONDON, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Euro zone bond yields fell on
Thursday after U.S. President Donald Trump said he planned to
unveil reciprocal tariffs later in the day.
Trump gave no details about his latest tariff plan, which
could take aim at every country that charges duties on U.S.
imports.
Traders were also digesting comments by the U.S. president
promising a swift end to the Ukraine war.
Trump separately discussed the war on Wednesday with Russian
President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelenskiy, and told U.S. officials to begin talks on ending the
nearly three-year-long conflict.
Oil and European natural gas prices fell
on Wednesday and Thursday, cooling concerns about inflation and
helping pull yields lower.
Germany's 10-year bond yield, the benchmark for the
euro zone, was last down 6 basis points (bps) at 2.419%. It rose
12 bps over the previous two sessions to its highest in almost
two weeks, partly driven by strong U.S. inflation data on
Wednesday. Yields move inversely to prices.
Data on Wednesday showed U.S. producer prices
increased solidly in January
, offering more evidence inflation was picking up again and
strengthening financial market views that the Federal Reserve
would not be cutting interest rates before the second half of
the year.
Meanwhile, weak euro zone
industrial data
added to the downward pressure on yields, with figures on
Thursday showing production shrank more than expected in
December.
Hauke Siemssen, rates strategist at Commerzbank, said bond
prices were stabilising after coming under pressure in part due
to large amounts of issuance in the last few days, including
syndications
from the European Union, France and Italy.
He said the potential for German bonds to rally on the back
of Ukraine peace talks is limited, given that the improvement in
investor sentiment would tend to favour stocks.
"Bunds look set to enter calmer waters with the
duration-intensive euro (bond) supply out of the way for the
rest of the week and the data calendar also thinning out," he
said. "Duration" denotes longer-dated bonds.
The two-year German bond yield, which is more
sensitive to European Central Bank interest rate expectations,
was 5 bps lower at 2.087% after rising 11 bps over the last two
sessions.
Traders on Thursday very slightly added to their bets on
further ECB cuts this year and now see around 77 bps of
reductions by the end of 2025.
Italy's 10-year yield was down 6 bps at 3.502%, and
the gap between Italian and German bond yields
narrowed 3 bps to 105 bps.