Treasuries rose for the first time in five days on speculation euro-area finance ministers meeting today will struggle to agree on a plan to clear an aid payment to Greece, underpinning demand for the safest assets. The 10-year yield fell from the highest level in two weeks after pro-independence parties in Spain’s Catalonia won a majority in a regional vote, strengthening a drive for a referendum on secession. Thirty-year bonds led gains before reports this week that economists say will show U.S. consumer spending cooled in October and business investment dropped, hindered by Hurricane Sandy and the looming fiscal cliff of scheduled tax increases and spending cuts. “Everybody is waiting for news on Greece,� said Niels From, chief analyst at Nordea Bank AB in Copenhagen. “That and the political situation in Spain raise question marks for the market and that provides support for Treasuries. There is also uncertainty surrounding the fiscal cliff.� The 10-year yield fell two basis points, or 0.02 percentage point, to 1.67 percent at 8:35 a.m. London time, according to Bloomberg Bond Trader prices. The 1.625 percent note due in November 2022 rose 7/32, or $2.19 per $1,000 face amount, to 99 5/8. The rate increased to 1.70 percent on Nov. 23, the highest since Nov. 7. The 30-year yields declined three basis points to 2.80 percent. Finance Ministers Finance chiefs from the 17-member single currency gather in Brussels today, less than a week after an all-night meeting failed to yield agreement on Greece. At stake today is the continuation of a three-year mission to return Greece to financial health. A breakthrough hinges on coming up with 10 billion euros ($13 billion) to fill the financing gap that emerged when Greece this month got two more years to meet deficit-reduction targets. Progress at the meeting may damp demand for the relative safety of Treasuries, said Hiroki Shimazu, an economist in Tokyo at SMBC Nikko Securities Inc., a unit of Japan’s third-largest publicly traded bank by assets. Catalan President Artur Mas, who called early elections in the Spanish region to force the debate on independence, won 50 of the 135 seats in the regional assembly for his Convergencia i Unio party, down from 62, with 99 percent of the vote counted. The separatist Catalan Republican Left more than doubled its seats to 21 from 10. Two smaller parties that also back a plebiscite secured 16 seats. Mas has pledged a referendum within four years. In contrast, the ERC would be willing to declare independence unilaterally in 2014. To contact the reporters on this story: Emma Charlton in London at echarlton1@bloomberg.net; Wes Goodman in Singapore at wgoodman@bloomberg.net. To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Dobson at pdobson2@bloomberg.net.

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