Bonds: Gilts outperform Treasuries as Greek debt slumps
These were the movements in some of the most widely-followed 10-year sovereign bond yields:
US: 2.49%(+0bp)
UK: 1.44% (-3bp)
Germany: 0.45% (-1bp)
France: 1.06% (+3bp)
Spain: 1.63% (+4bp)
Italy: 2.33% (+10bp)
Portugal: 4.24% (+10bp)
Greece: 7.61% (+43bp)
Japan: 0.09% (+0bp)
Gilts outperformed as the somewhat confusing news-flow out of the States over the weekend appeared to cap gains in US Treasuries, even as the continuing stand-off between Greece and its creditors took its toll on euro area periphery debt.
Risk aversion picked up following confusion over the weekend regarding the exact scope of the US administration's temporary ban on immigration from several majority Muslim countries.
In parallel, reports on Saturday, citing an official order, indicated that the chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff and the head of national intelligence had been removed from the so-called principals committee, except where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed, while senior adviser Steve Bannon was added.
On Sunday, in an interview with NBC News, White House chief of staff Reince Priebus denied the content of those reports as pertained to the JCS and intelligence chief.
At least one US senator and another ex-high ranking government official expressed surprise that the chairman of the JCS might have been excluded from the meetings of that committee following the re-organisation.
Over the weekend, Athens failed to bridge differences with its creditors over the conditions the country still needed to meet in order to be given access to its next aid package.
For its part, in a report obtained by Bloomberg the International Monetary Fund said Greece's public finances were "fundamentally inefficient, unfair, and ultimately socially unsustainable," calling into question whether the Washington-based lender would rejoin the Greek bailout or not.
A meeting of euro area finance ministers on 20 February had been set by one European official as the deadline for reaching an agreement, due to the multiple European elections which would be celebrated after that.