Asia saw a dramatic collapse today of some 8.5%. That is how London started their session today looking at Asia. European futures were obviously all lower and they did not look back from the open. The US session just accelerated the fall which saw strengthened the recent flight to quality helping to cement the ultimate peak in government debt/low in short-term rates.

Oil was under pressure yet again today (Brent 53.45 -2.2%) which hit the Russian Rouble closing down 1.6% on the day. We also saw the Turkish Lira lose another 1.2% on the day – sadly a daily occurrence amid the recent violence.

Given the flight to quality in the bond market and the Fed in play this week, today’s curve move tells the picture. We saw 2 yrs better by 2bp (0.65%) whilst 5 yrs were lower by 5bp and 10’s by 4bp respectively. 5yr notes were last traded and 1.57% and 10’s last seen at 2.22%. All this purpose and yet volumes are still a shadow of yesterday’s markets. Even with the renewed bond market interest, daily volumes for Bunds are still only around 400k contracts warning there is no real depth to these markets.

Bund/TY 10yr spread closed this evening at 153bp which, given the strength of the Euro today was a very impressive performance for US Treasuries.

Gold was relatively well behaved today trading in a rather tight ($17 range). Early attempts at maintaining the 1100 level were dashed as the US opened.