A sell-off in US government debt sparked by expectations that Joe Biden’s $1.9tn stimulus push will stoke higher levels of inflation rippled across Wall Street on Thursday.
US stocks notched their first three-day losing streak this year, with the blue-chip S&P 500 index closing lower by 0.4 per cent. The technology-focused Nasdaq Composite had larger losses, slipping 0.7 per cent. Thursday’s declines were broad, with energy, technology and industrial companies leading the way lower.
The falls came as the yield on 10-year Treasury notes traded as high as 1.318 per cent, near the one-year high reached in the previous trading session. Yields have jumped about 0.4 percentage points this year as investors have upgraded their outlooks for US economic growth and inflation.