Argentine stocks and bonds fell on Friday, pushed down by concerns that rising yields of US Treasury bonds may lure investment flows away from emerging markets. The MerVal index fell 0.22 percent to close at 2,229.9 points, but ended the week with a gain of 0.6 percent.
"The MerVal's performance was good when one considers that it was a very complicated day on global markets, given the ups and downs of the US market," said Claudio Szlaien, an analyst with Marlon Financial Resources. On the MerVal, Banco Macro fell 0.1 percent to close at 10.3 pesos, while energy distributor Transener climbed 4.34 percent to 2.16 pesos.
Trade volume on the broad market was 85.9 million pesos ($27.7 million), and of active shares, 41 advanced, 30 declined, and 15 were unchanged. Argentine bonds dipped as US bond yields remained strong, traders said. The price of Argentina's Boden 2014 slid 1.05 percent in over-the-counter trade and 0.5 percent on the Buenos Aires Stock Exchange.
The yield on benchmark 10-year US bonds was 5.14 percent on Friday. "It's hard to expect enthusiasm for Argentine bonds with US yields holding at levels around 5.20 percent," said Roberto Drimer, an analyst at Argentine Research. In informal trade between foreign exchange houses, the peso currency closed flat at 3.10/3.1025 per dollar.
In formal interbank trade, where the central bank buys dollars every day to keep the peso from appreciating, the currency also remained unchanged, closing at 3.08/3.0825 pesos per dollar.