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.
New figures from the National Bureau of Statistics of China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing showed Wednesday morning a slower pace of growth in the Chinese service sector. PMI index for the service sector fell to 53.7 in September from 56.3 in August. A figure above 50 indicates rising activity.
In Spain, the country's prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, again has given wrinkled forehead among investors by saying that he does not expect to seek a bailout from the EU anytime soon. This gives reason for caution among investors, as reflected in the trading of government securities, which showed little movements Wednesday afternoon.
Instead, focus shifted to the ADP-job report from the U.S., and it came out positive with an increase of 162,000 jobs in September, against an expected 140,000. The report, which is private and usually is used as an indicator of the official employment report from the U.S., presented on Friday, has proved inaccurate in the past, and therefore it only briefly gave momentum to the financial markets that quickly rediscovered the quiet position around zero.
The ISM index for the U.S. service sector was also positive, rising to index 55.1 in September from 53.7 in August. There was expecting a drop to 53.4, and thus it was clearly better than expected. Again, the reaction was, however, a short-term boost to markets that have since dropped back again.
Wednesday morning figures for retail sales ticked in for the euro zone in August. They showed a surprising increase of 0.1 percent in sales in the 17 euro countries against an expected decline of 0.1 percent.
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