German bunds continue uptrend ahead of ECB President Draghi’s speech, 30-year auction

The German bunds gained during European session Tuesday ahead of the European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi’s speech, scheduled to be held today by 15:00GMT. Also, the country’s 30-year auction, due to be held on January 16 by 10:40GMT will add further direction to the debt market.

The German 10-year bond yields, which move inversely to its price, plunged 3 basis points to 0.203 percent, the yield on 30-year note slumped nearly 2-1/2 basis points to 0.815 percent and the yield on short-term 2-year traded 1-1/2 basis points down at -0.610 percent by 09:40GMT.

In the euro area, today will bring Mario Draghi’s first public utterances of the year when he addresses the European Parliament in Strasbourg. That will give him an opportunity to discuss the continued loss of momentum in the euro area economy – illustrated by yesterday’s dire IP figures which showed a drop of 1.7 percent m/m, the most since early 2016 – which strongly suggests that the ECB’s economic forecasts remain overoptimistic and that the Governing Council will struggle to raise rates this year.

Data-wise, today brings a preliminary full-year German GDP growth figure for 2018 along with an estimate of the government budget surplus – consistent with forecast of a modest rebound of 0.2 percent q/q in Q4, with expectations that the figures will show full-year GDP growth of 1.5 percent down from 2.2 percent in 2017. November’s euro area goods trade data are also due and likely to indicate that net trade remained a drag on growth towards the end of last year, Daiwa Capital Markets reported.

Meanwhile, the German DAX rose 0.40 percent to 10,896.48 by 09:50GMT, while at 09:00GMT, the FxWirePro's Hourly Euro Strength Index remained highly bearish at -118.22 (higher than +75 represents bullish trend). For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex