Bonds: Treasuries and bunds gain amid weak data, redemptions

These were the movements in the most widely-followed long-term sovereign bond yields:

US: 1.75% (-4bp)

UK: 1.41% (-4bp)

Germany: 0.13% (-4bp)

France: 0.47% (-4bp)

Spain: 1.50% (-1bp)

Italy: 1.33% (-2bp)

Japan:-0.12% (-2bp)

Portugal: 3.17% (-8bp)

Greece: 8.97% (-37bp)

Sovereign bonds advanced at the end of the week, pushing yields lower, supported by weaker than forecast headline readings on economic data Stateside and easing supply conditions in the euro area.

In the States, industrial output fell by a greater-than-expected 0.6% month-on-month in March, according to the latest data from the Federal Reserve, which was much steeper than the 0.1% dip forecast by economists.

Manufacturing output fell 0.3%, with the production of durables down 0.4%.

Survey results from the University of Michigan showed consumer sentiment eased in April. The preliminary estimate for the confidence index was 89.7 in April, down from 91.0 in March and worse than the 92.0 reading expected by analysts.

Nonetheless, “with the job market very strong and stocks almost back to their highs, we see no reason for this decline in the index to become a sustained trend,” said Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.

The spread between the two and thirty-year benchmark US Treasuries slipped by one basis point to 183, with traders still only assigning even odds to another interest rate hike by the Fed in 2016 and no chance at all of that when the Federal Open Market Committee next gathers on 26/27 April.

German bunds moved up on Friday, but were nevertheless lower for the week, as debt auctions in the likes of France bolstered supply and weighed down on prices across the Eurozone.

Helping matters, €16.2bn of five-year Italian government debt matured on Friday, with Dublin expected to repay investors holding €7.3bn of debt on 18 April.

Acting as a backdrop, Chicago Fed president Charles Evans sounded a rather optimistic note on the American economy, adding that he still believed two rate hikes were likely over the course of 2016.

However, the regional Fed boss also said that the central bank needed to keep defending its inflation credentials, even at the risk of so-called 'overshooting' its target of 2.0%.

"Inflation is the responsibility of the central bank. If we are at one percent and it is supposed to be two percent, that is us. If it is three percent, that is us," Evans said, according to Reuters.