By Mike Dolan
Oct 6 (Reuters) – Sovereign bond markets can’t find a break, but US tech stocks march on regardless.
Monday’s trading on Wall Street was remarkable as the tech-heavy Nasdaq jumped more than 1% to a new record, even as long-term Treasury yields burst higher again to levels not seen since 2002.
There were no obvious triggers for either, beyond a running assumption ahead of the third-quarter earnings season this month that the AI-driven economic expansion continues apace and is generating inflation heat at the margins.
The headline reading for the September ISM service sector survey on Monday was a little lower than forecast, but the price input component hit its highest in four years.
Meantime, there were reports that a wave of AI cross-financing between Broadcom and Anthropic got underway on Monday, while Nvidia’s stock is now pushing to within sight of a staggering $6 trillion market cap.
In Europe, the French bond storm seemed to calm a little as investors eyed the next developments in the fractious budget process in Paris, where right-wing presidential candidate Marine Le Pen on Tuesday presented proposals for government spending cuts.
Investors are also taking in the prospect of another year-end election, with Spain now heading to the polls on November 29. The euro steadied from Monday’s near 18-month lows.
Aside from US midterms and the Spanish snap election next month, the other big election is in Brazil.
Brazilian stocks, bonds and the real soared on Monday after the first round of presidential elections put right-wing candidate Flavio Bolsonaro, son of convicted former president Jair Bolsonaro, in the final runoff against left-wing incumbent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The two-way poll is scheduled for October 25. The near 8% jump in Brazil’s Bovespa stock benchmark on Monday was its biggest daily rise since 2020, taking the index to a record closing high.
Stateside on Tuesday, Wall Street will look out for August US trade data, a 3-year Treasury auction and another list of Fed speakers, including New York Fed boss John Williams.
Chart of the day
Gulf oil flows excluding Iran surged to over 81% of pre-war levels in September, data shows. The rise was led by a recovery in Saudi exports despite attacks on the kingdom’s oil infrastructure and escalating Iranian attacks on regional shipping, while Iranian exports fell to zero due to a US blockade.
Flows of crude, condensate and refined fuels including LPG averaged 19.2 million barrels per day from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, Iraq and the UAE, Vortexa data showed. That compares with an average of about 23.6 million bpd in the year that preceded the outbreak of the Iran war on February 28.
Today’s events to watch
• US August trade balance (8:30 a.m. EDT)
• US 3-year note auction (1 p.m. EDT)
• Fed’s Michelle Bowman and regional Fed presidents John Williams and Lorie Logan speak
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