Bonds: Calm winds on interest-front

There was relatively quiet on the bond markets in Europe Tuesday, where a lack of news and remain closed trading in the U.S. meant very little fluctuation in interest rates.

Spain's economic growth lagged not quite as much as economists feared in the third quarter. Growth in gross domestic product, GDP, was Tuesday morning amounted to minus 1.6 percent in the third quarter compared with the same period last year. Economists had expected a decline of 1.7 percent, which was in line with data earlier this month from the Bank of Spain.

Stocks: Sprint secured pluses in New York

It went up and down on the U.S. stock market on Friday. Investors are keeping a close eye on the economic data that alternately disappoints and shows good performance.

Dow Jones index ended the day with a minimal increase of 0.03 percent to index 13,107. S&P 500 ended the day with a small loss of 0.07 percent to Index 1411, while the Nasdaq rose by 0.06 percent to index 2987.

Bonds: Spanish messages turned the picture

Bond dealers were almost gone for the weekend before Friday's trade. In any case, there were close to absolute rest on a trading day, which was marked by cautious buying almost across the board.

This resulted in a slight decline in interest rates in both South and North Europe most of the day, but new reports that Spain has not intend to seek official help for its pressed banking sector reversed the picture in Spain and Italy, which ended with small increases in interest rates.

Europe: Kept momentum in Spanish redemption

The European market Wednesday insisted its upward momentum after a long-awaited report from Moody's on Spain did not contain the expected downgrade of its credit rating. At the same time a string of positive news for several large European companies sent mood firmly upwards.

Beige Book: Modest growth in the U.S. economy

With improved figures for the housing market and car sales and not least the labor market it is a U.S. economy that is showing 'modest growth'.

That is according to the trend report Beige Book, published Wednesday evening. It presents 12 districts - regional branches of the Federal Reserve - their assessment of how the economy in their field are doing, collected by the central bank, Fed.

Europe: Fall dominated

European stocks closed in red on Tuesday. Measured on the Stoxx 600-index, there was a decrease of 0.5 percent to 270.20. 441 of the index 600 shares fell. The three largest stock markets in Europe closed lower. In Britain, there was a decrease of 0.5 percent and in Germany of 0.8 percent, while shares in France fell by 0.7 percent.

Euro rescue fund with 500 billion euro is ready

Two years after the euro countries started to design a new, permanent rescue fund for their ailing economies, the fund - called ESM – is now a reality.

Economy and finance ministers from the 17 euro countries are Monday meeting in Luxembourg to founding the board of the fund, which should eventually be able to support problem countries with up to 500 billion euro.

Bonds: Interest rate increase after job report

Bond yields in Northern Europe was Friday sent up by surprisingly good U.S. job figures, which were as expected in September but contained upward revisions of the previous two months' figures. It sent investors to back the tables to turn up the knob that controls the "risk-on". This gave rise in stock markets, rising interest rates in the safe countries and declining yields in riskier countries from southern Europe.

Currency: Euro strengthened on ECB comments

The European Central Bank on Thursday kept the benchmark interest rate on the main refinancing operations at 0.75 percent. This was not a surprise from the ECB as the only few individual analysts and economists had expected a reduction in European interest rates.

Bonds: Interest rates fall in the north and increases in south

Wednesday was a very quiet day in the bond markets in Europe, where the result of investors' side stepping was a small decline in interest rates in northern Europe and similar small increases in Southern Europe.

It was still the macroeconomic events that had control of the financial markets with Spain, China and the U.S. in the lead roles.

U.S.: ISM services index surprisingly rose in September

The U.S. ISM index of activity in the service sector, ISM non-manufacturing, rose to index 55.1 in September from 53.7 the previous month.

Currency: Small adjustments but fall in Australian dollar

Tuesday and it’s again slow with movements in international currency markets. Investors follow the familiar pattern of strengthening of the euro as the risk desire increased, while the dollar and the yen weakened. There are, however, relatively small shifts, although there is no doubt about the trend.

Europe: Steady increases kicks off the last quarter

The European stock markets opened the fourth quarter with decent gains after the release of the results of the Spanish bank test, which showed a capital needs in the context of what was devoted to the Spanish banking sector in the EU rescue fund EFSF. Moreover, U.S. data helped lift the mood as the ISM index for U.S. manufacturing showed a somewhat larger increase than expected.