Rates are starting to ease slightly (-4 to -5 basis points in both the US and the EU), with rather reassuring inflation figures in both the US and Europe.
Wednesday's losses have been erased, but this is only a technical movement and not yet the start of a downward cycle.

The most eagerly awaited US figures of the week, and indeed of the last 10 days, have been released, and all are in line with expectations.

According to the Commerce Department, the PCE price inflation index stood at +2.4% annualized in January, down 0.2 points on December 2023, in line with Jefferies' forecast.

Excluding food and energy, two usually volatile categories, the underlying index fell from +2.9% to +2.8% month-on-month, again in line with the broker's forecast.

Also according to the Commerce Department, consumer spending in the US rose by 0.2% last month compared with December, on income growth of 1% month-on-month.

The Labor Department reported +13,000 new US jobless claims for the week of February 19, to 215,000.
The four-week moving average - more representative of the underlying trend - came in at 212,500 for the same week, down by 3,000 on the previous week's revised average.

T-Bonds improved slightly (-3.6pts to 4.2400%) and, according to the FedWatch barometer, the market now rules out any reduction in the cost of money in March and May, but the scenario of a rate cut in June is deemed credible by 51% of traders.

On the Old Continent, the first monthly inflation figures for Germany published at 2:00 p.m. (down from 2.7% in February to 3.1%) point to a further fall in prices to levels not seen since June 2021.
Bunds and OATs are in line with T-Bonds, with -5pts to 2.412% and 2.883% respectively... Italian BTPs follow suit, with -5pts to 3.844%, erasing Tuesday's and the previous day's poor session.

This morning, the markets were able to take note of the second estimate of French gross domestic product (GDP) for the fourth quarter of 2023: GDP was revised slightly upwards from 0.00% to +0.1%, according to detailed data from Insee (but salaried employment fell by -0.1%).

In addition, according to Insee's provisional end-of-month estimate, consumer prices in France rose by 2.9% year-on-year in February 2024, a slight slowdown after +3.1% in January.

Lastly, in January 2024, French household consumption expenditure on goods fell by 0.3% in volume terms over one month, following an increase of 0.3% in December 2023, according to Insee's CVS-CJO data.


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