Soaring borrowing costs spurred experts to warn of a gathering fiscal crisis, particularly in Europe. France remains at the epicenter of the storm, after a proposed budget yesterday failed to quell investors’ anxiety over its fast-rising borrowing.
But worries are growing elsewhere: UK 30-year yields hit 6%, the first time a G7 member has faced such high interest rates since the 2012 eurozone crisis, while other indebted countries such as Italy and Greece saw bond yields widen sharply compared to those of the European benchmark, Germany. “European bond markets are showing the first signs of broader contagion,” ING economists said, while one portfolio manager told The Wall Street Journal, “markets have the faint smell of a crisis in the making.”