Investors return to euro zone havens as Trump resumes pressure on China

Reuters
Two Euro coins are seen at the Money Service Austria company's headquarters in Vienna, Austria, November 16, 2017. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger/Files

By Virginia Furness

LONDON (Reuters) - Core euro zone bonds yields fell on Monday as investors sought safe havens after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to raise tariffs on China, while PMI data pointed to anaemic growth in the euro zone.

Trump's move marked an escalation in tensions between the world's largest economies and a shift in tone from Trump, who had cited progress in trade talks as recently as Friday.

Global equity markets fell, with China's main indexes down 5 percent. Treasuries rallied after Trump said tariffs on $200 billion of goods would rise on Friday to 25 percent from 10 percent.

The president also said he would target a further $325 billion of Chinese goods with 25 percent tariffs "shortly", essentially covering all products imported to the United States from China.

Germany's 10-year government bond yield, the benchmark for the region, went negative for the first time since April 30, down 2.4 basis points on the day to -0.002 percent before rising to 0.014 percent.

"Everyone was quite optimistic that they were close to a deal … " said Daniel Lenz, rates strategist at DZ Bankit. Trump's threat "may cause the opposite action, talks might come to a stop, which is the fear everyone has."

Most other core 10-year yields in the bloc fell around two basis points,.

Data on Monday painted a mixed picture of euro zone economic growth. Germany's services stood out among a gloomier bloc-wide report from research firm Markit's final purchasing manager data for April.

German services created jobs in April at the fastest rate in more than a decade, offsetting deteriorating manufacturing, the data showed. But overall, weakness in euro zone manufacturing increasingly affected the dominant services industry.

IHS Markit's Euro Zone Composite Final Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI), considered a good measure of overall economic health, dipped to 51.5 in April from March's 51.6.

However, overall investor improved for the third month in a row, reaching its highest since November 2018, the Sentix research group said on Monday.

ITALY IN FOCUS

Italian government bonds underperformed the rest of the periphery. Concerns about the stability of the Italian government added to worries about global trade.

Italian Deputy Prime Minister Luigi di Maio said on Monday a graft case involving a junior minister from the ruling League party would trigger a government crisis only if the League itself pushed for it.

Italy's short-dated bonds were up to six basis points higher before pulling back. The spread of its 10-year debt over Germany's widened to nearly 260 basis points for the first time since April 30.

(Reporting by Virginia Furness, editing by Larry King)