By Emelia Sithole-Matarise
LONDON, March 4 (Reuters) - German bond yields rose on Wednesday before final data on euro zone manufacturing activity but the market's pull-back is seen tempered by the prospect of imminent European Central Bank quantitative easing.
Data released earlier showed activity in China's services sector grew modestly last month and orders rose at their quickest pace in three months.
Focus is also on U.S. private sector hiring numbers later in the day, a precursor to the market-moving non-farm payrolls report on Friday which will give the latest temperature on the pace of economic recovery in the world's biggest economy.
Data from the euro zone has broadly beat forecasts so far this year and the final readings of euro zone manufacturing for February come after Tuesday's strong German retail sales report that prompted a rebound in German yields from record lows hit last week.
German 10-year yields, which set the benchmark for euro zone borrowing costs, were up 2 basis points at 0.38 percent, off an all-time low of 0.285 percent.
"We see the core underperforming led by Germany and on the other hand slightly better performance of the weaker EMU bonds helped by more optimistic data but I don't think we will see a major negative surprise from the final PMIs this morning," said DZ Bank strategist Christian Lenk.
"Investors maybe are scaling back a little bit their positioning ahead of tomorrow's ECB meeting and some are having more positive views on Friday's U.S. data ... Nevertheless I don't see this as a major reversal."
The ECB is expected to give operational details of its trillion euro securities purchases at its policy meeting on Thursday. The programme is due to start this month and although the rally that pushed yields on Spanish, Italian and Portuguese yields to record lows on Monday has paused as investors wait for QE details, underlying sentiment remains firm.
Spanish, Italian and Portuguese yields were a touch up on the day at 1.33 percent, 1.40 percent and 1.94 percent, respectively, slightly off Monday's troughs.
Greek yields were indicated flat after the leftist-led government in Athens insisted it will not run out of money this month or soon and has promised to detail its reform plans at a meeting of euro zone finance ministers next Monday.
Despite agreeing a four-month extension to its bailout, the euro zone is wary of giving Athens any more financial help until it is sure it will meet its commitments under that programme.
(Reporting by Emelia Sithole-Matarise; Editing by Toby Chopra)