Today, and indeed the week in general was fairly straightforward as far as bond markets were concerned. Today brought a fairly well anticipated jobs report. It came out quite a bit higher than expected. There were no noticeable downsides. And the increasingly important wage growth component rose to its highest year-over-year level since before the recession.
No one would be mad at the labor market if it simply decided to level-off around a job count of 125-150k, which would be more than enough to keep the unemployment rate pegged to the floor. The fact that job growth is accelerating is cause for concern in the bond market, and that concern is evident in today's rate surge. It's really that simple--nothing to do with "trade optimism" or whatever it is that the average news article is chalking today's move up to.
Batten down hatches for another potential challenge of long-term highs in Treasury yields next week. For whatever it's worth, there are some well-respected analysts out there who think bonds are still in the process of putting in a ceiling around 3.25%, and that we won't necessarily go much higher than that. You know what they say about predictions though.