German chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz reached an agreement with the Greens on Friday on a massive increase in state borrowing, just days before a parliamentary vote on the issue, a source close to the negotiations said.

Germany's likely next chancellor, Friedrich Merz, on Friday hailed a cross-party agreement on a landmark infrastructure and defence package amounting to €500 billion ($545 billion). The agreement between his conservative bloc,

Global equities sank on Thursday with the S&P 500 confirming it was in a correction while U.S. Treasury prices rose as investors fled for safer assets as they worried that global trade tensions would boost inflation and slow growth after U.S. President Donald Trump's latest tariff threats.