Top Bonds News

By Ian Chua and Hideyuki Sano SYDNEY/TOKYO, Feb 21 (Reuters) - The euro dipped on profit-taking on Monday after hitting its highest level in more than 10 days as a European Central Bank official kept alive the prospect of the ECB hiking interest rates before the Federal Reserve. The euro lacked the vigour to break above key resistances after Germany's main ruling party suffered a crushing defeat at a regional election in the city-state of Hamburg on Sunday, making it harder for Chancellor Angela Merkel to pass federal legislation. "The German ruling party's loss is making it difficult to pursue the euro's upside for now," said a trader at a Japanese bank. The common currency was trading at $1.3683, down 0.1 percent from late U.S. trade last week. A trader for a Japanese brokerage house in Tokyo said the euro was pressured by profit-taking after its earlier rise. The single currency briefly rose to $1.3727 in early Monday trade, the highest since Feb. 10, extending its...

The optimism could continue containing the current market sentiment after the Japanese promises of buying European bonds this month by a successful Portuguese auction driving the single currency up above 1.31 after it has started the week under the pressure of rumors about European efforts to convince Portugal to join the bailing out package following Ireland to reach 1.2873 versus the greenback but the Portuguese denying of the need for this made package by European countries and the IMF could help the single currency to rebound underpinned by new Japanese pledges of buying European bonds following  china which has done the same to restore market confidence in the European debt markets driving the market risk appetite up amid increased market expectations of better US earning reports to come showing improving in the fourth quarter of last year which weighed negatively on the low costing funding currency like the Japanese yen and the greenback across the broad but versus the Aussi...

Another year had passed by for the world’s largest economy, where the level of expectations was high, yet the economy failed to meet those expectations, as the worst recession since the Great Depression proved to be far worse than anyone had expected, nevertheless, the economy continued to recover throughout 2010, although the recovery was rather poor and slow, but 2011 seems to be a far better year for the United States economy. Housing to Continue Stabilizing The housing market in the United States failed to recover sufficiently in 2010, where elevated unemployment, tightened credit conditions, and record foreclosures continued to weigh down heavily on housing market activities, nevertheless, the housing market continued to stabilize throughout 2010, where activity continued to fluctuate heavily. However, this upcoming year seems to be much better for the housing market, where although we still expect more challenges to arise, but we really believe that conditions will improve drastically in 2011 compared to 2010. The Federal Reserve Bank decided in...

By Aaron Pressman BOSTON (Reuters) - The bond market's horrific two-month stretch is teaching U.S. investors who poured some $700 billion into fixed income mutual funds in recent years a harsh lesson about risk. Bond funds have been absolutely crushed in the recent Treasury market selloff that began after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernake announced a second round of government bond-buying, dubbed "quantitative easing 2." The downdraft accelerated in recent days amid fears the U.S. budget deficit is out of control. Long-term government bond funds have lost 9.4 percent from mid-September through Dec. 7, according to Morningstar. And the price of the iShares Barclays 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF is down 11.4 percent. The losses came as a painful wake-up call for investors who have been buying bond funds hand over fist for most of the past two years. Through late November, investors have poured a net $268.4 billion into fixed income mutual funds this year while yanking a net $30.9 billion from stock funds,...

Standard & Poor's Ratings Services today raised to 'AAA (sf)' from 'AA (sf)' its rating on the class J unsecured bonds issued by Hydra Funding Corp. (see list below). At the same time, Standard & Poor's affirmed its 'AAA (sf)' ratings on classes S-1, S-3, and S-4, issued under the same transaction (also listed below). Hydra Funding Corp.'s class S-2 and class O unsecured bonds have already been fully redeemed. Today's rating actions are part of our regular review. In analyzing the credit quality of the aforementioned transaction, we examined the data contained in the reports that we receive each month from the servicer and trustee. Through this review we confirmed that the performance of the underlying loan receivables is in line with our assumptions, and the level of credit support for the underlying asset pool has risen, reflecting the progress of principal redemption for the senior class bonds. Accordingly, we raised our rating on class J. The class J bonds issued...

Tom Bradley, President and Co-Founder of Steadyhand, wrote an article on Prem Watsa with a bit more of the factors that have contributed to Mr. Watsa’s success as an investor. Thought I’d share as a follow-up to yesterday’s articles. We also need to remember that Prem is as ‘non-benchmark’ as they come. He goes where he finds value, regardless of what others are doing. He can be seriously out of sync with the overall market for long periods of time, which would be psychological agony for a lesser investor. Being wrong is one thing, but being wrong alone is quite another. Read more here: http://advisoranalyst.com/glablog/2010/12/02/be-like-prem/

Following are comments by Klaus Regling, head of the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) during a visit to Singapore: ON BOND ISSUE The EFSF will issue bonds "in January next year". "If everything goes to plan they will make a profit" in Germany. "Most will probably be taken up in Europe" although, he added there was also significant interest in Asia and Middle East. Ireland bonds will be disbursed over a three-year period, Regling said, but this will be "substantially front-loaded". "The average loan maturity (in the whole Ireland support package) will be 7 and a half years." The first issue is likely in January 2011 to be in "range of five to eight billion" euros. "The 440 billion euros will be sufficient" ON EURO SOLIDARITY "There is no country in the Euro area that has any intention of leaving...there is no movement to leave the euro, even in the countries that have been hard hit" ON EFSF'S CREDIT RATING "I see no risk of us (EFSF) losing our AAA-rating even if...

By Karen Brettell NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. Treasuries slipped on Wednesday, more than reversing Tuesday's gains, as speculation that the ECB could take decisive steps to combat turmoil in the region lifted risky assets including stocks and reduced demand for safe-haven debt. Strong economic data and profit taking added to price weakness. Speculation grew on Wednesday that the European Central Bank could unveil new anti-crisis measures after it meets on Thursday, including possibly new purchases of government bonds. The ECB declined to comment on the bond purchase speculation. "We've got a lot of traders, particularly in Europe, hopeful that the European central bank is going to address a great deal of more support for weaker sovereigns," said Jim Vogel, interest rate strategist at FTN Financial in Memphis, Tennessee. Also, "investors were looking for an opportunity to reduce their positions in high grade government bonds," he added. Benchmark 10-year Treasury notes

LONDON, Nov 29 (IFR) - The bailout statement released last night did little to clarify the situation on the treatment of senior/subordinated bondholders. What we did get was some assurance from Olli Rehn that senior bondholders would not be subjected to any haircuts/burden sharing, after being questioned by the press at the press conference last night. This should give the market a degree of stability following a dismal performance in the sector last week. Had there been a haircut imposed on senior debt, there would have been a contagious effect in funding markets that may have been more difficult to reverse than just recapitalising the Irish banking sector. To this effect there has been some positive price action this morning on the open. This has seen senior debt on Irish banks snap higher, with AIB ALBK.I 5.625 pct 2014 some 7.5 points higher to 79-83, equating to a move tighter to swaps of over 200bps, back to levels seen last Monday having traded...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Steps by the Federal Reserve to pump more money into the U.S. economy through government bond purchases could stoke inflation, even though growth will remain moderate through 2011, a survey showed on Monday. The National Association for Business Economics (NABE) said its 51-member forecasting panel continued to rank inflation as a bigger worry than deflation. The survey was conducted between October 21 and November 4. The Fed's November 3 decision to buy an additional $600 billion worth of government bonds to stimulate the economy and prevent prices for spiraling lower has been criticized both at home and abroad. About a third of NABE panelists view the Fed's second asset purchasing program as somewhat lessening the risks of deflation, while another 33 percent saw the step as risking inflation. Still, they forecast the Fed's preferred measure of consumer inflation -- the personal consumption expenditures price index excluding food and energy -- to rise to 1.5 percent by the end of 2011 from...