Surging bond yields lead global equities lower

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) – A jump in benchmark U.S. Treasury yields on Thursday led a gauge of global equity markets to retreat as investors sold the high-flying tech stocks that fueled Wall Street’s rally to record highs and took precautions against the threat of inflation.

Fears of rising consumer prices from ongoing central bank stimulus and its impact on global growth helped drive copper prices to their highest in almost a decade as investors scrambled to buy metals as an inflation hedge.

Gold prices fell as much as 2% as the surge in Treasury yields and strong U.S. economic data dented demand for the traditional inflation hedge. Higher bond yields have increased the opportunity cost of holding bullion.

Euro zone bond yields also spiked despite the European Central Bank saying it was closely watching their rise, as inflation fears continued to a sell-off in Treasury market.

Investors are taking profits in the high-flying tech sector and moving into more conservative bonds with their rising yields, said Jeffrey Carbone, managing partner at Cornerstone Wealth in Huntersville, North Carolina.

“The market is starting to get a bit frothy,” Carbone said. “The higher the yield on bonds, the more we see this push to move out of stocks.”

Apple Inc, Tesla Inc, Microsoft Corp, NVIDIA Corp and Amazon.com Inc were the biggest drags on the S&P 500 and Nasdaq.

MSCI’s all-country world index fell 0.59% to 671.41, also pulled down by the big U.S. tech names, a large component of the global stock benchmark.

Europe’s broad FTSEurofirst 300 index closed down 0.18% to 1,585.48. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.87%, the S&P 500 lost 1.33% and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 2.11%.

“There are two clear stories now,” said CMC Markets senior analyst Michael Hewson. “You have the concerns about rising yields, and they are continuing to move higher today, and then you have got an economic recovery story, which is helping lift the more moderately-valued parts of the market.”

Bond traders pushed up a closely watched part of the Treasury yield curve that measures the difference between yields on two- and 10-year notes. The gap, seen as an indicator of economic expectations, widened as much as 132 basis points, the most since late 2016.

Yields on the 10-year Treasury note hit 1.494%, above the estimated 1.48% yield that dividends of S&P 500 provide, dulling the shine a bit for investing in equities.

The dollar index fell to a seven-week low while the Australian and Canadian dollars both hit three-year high as global growth optimism lifted commodity prices worldwide.

The dollar index fell 0.264%, with the euro up 0.57% to $1.2233. The Japanese yen weakened 0.32% versus the greenback at 106.20 per dollar.

Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange climbed 1.2% to $9,417 a tonne, about 6% below its record high of $10,190 a tonne hit in February 2011.

Oil prices held near 13-month highs, with profit-taking limited by the Federal Reserve’s assurance that U.S. interest rates will stay low and a sharp drop in U.S. crude output last week due to the winter storm in Texas.

Brent crude futures rose $0.02 to $67.06 a barrel. U.S. crude futures gained $0.29 to $63.51 a barrel.

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