Fri, Jul 21 2017, 9:29 AM
One of the hallmarks of classic (read: old school) technical analysis is the role of volume in confirming market movements. For instance, if 10yr y...
Thu, Jul 20 2017, 7:06 PM
Talk about your anticlimactic conclusions! It's not that the European Central Bank (ECB) was likely to make any meaningful changes in its policy stan...
Thu, Jul 20 2017, 5:59 PM
Mortgage rates held relatively steady today, keeping them in line with the lowest levels in more than 3 weeks. There was relatively little market move...
Thu, Jul 20 2017, 8:33 AM
Mario Draghi is the President of the European Central Bank (ECB). That's the EU's version of the Fed. Like the Fed in the past, the ECB is still ad...
Wed, Jul 19 2017, 5:56 PM
Much has been made of tomorrow's European Central Bank (ECB) Announcement, mainly because of its proximity to ECB President Draghi's comments on June ...
Wed, Jul 19 2017, 4:56 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower today, despite slightly weaker underlying bond markets. This has been an ongoing phenomenon in recent days. Bonds improve, ...
Wed, Jul 19 2017, 9:41 AM
This commentary will begin it's life as the "day ahead" entry for July 19th, 2017, but it may as well be a "knowledge base" entry for the validity of ...
Tue, Jul 18 2017, 4:45 PM
If there is one thematic event at the heart of the past 4 weeks, it was a series of comments from European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi b...
Tue, Jul 18 2017, 3:45 PM
Mortgage rates fell today, but continue lagging behind the movements seen in underlying bond markets. Part of that has to do with the timing of bond m...
Tue, Jul 18 2017, 9:12 AM
It remains the case that Thursday is the focal point of the week, with European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi set to tell reporters how fa...
Mon, Jul 17 2017, 4:59 PM
Mortgage rates are largely dictated by movements in bond markets--specifically mortgage-backed securities (MBS). When bonds improve, prices rise and i...
Mon, Jul 17 2017, 4:57 PM
Today was an exceptionally light day in terms of news, volume, participation, and everything else we normally care about when it comes to market mov...
Mon, Jul 17 2017, 9:18 AM
It's the middle of summertime, the middle of a month, and there's a light economic and event calendar in the US. These are prime conditions for tra...
Fri, Jul 14 2017, 4:58 PM
Today was bittersweet for bond markets, with strong gains in the morning, and an almost complete reversal by the end of the day. As expected, the e...
Fri, Jul 14 2017, 4:03 PM
Mortgage rates are experiencing increased volatility at the end of this week, which was to-be-expected given the calendar of events and economic data....
Fri, Jul 14 2017, 8:59 AM
Today begins with weaker economic data helping bonds move into stronger territory. Investors had been eagerly awaiting the Retail Sales and CPI data ...
Thu, Jul 13 2017, 6:17 PM
Take market analysis with a grain of salt today. To a much greater extent than yesterday, market-watchers would have to dig to connect the dots bet...
Thu, Jul 13 2017, 5:45 PM
Mortgage rates had their first great day in several weeks yesterday, but ended up giving back some of those gains today. Bond markets that underlie in...
Thu, Jul 13 2017, 8:56 AM
For the entire first quarter of 2017, bonds held inside a range from roughly 2.30 to 2.60 in terms of 10yr yields. This was the purgatory we occupi...
Wed, Jul 12 2017, 5:20 PM
" Support " and " resistance " are two terms often thrown around in market analysis. They loosely refer to ceilings and floors respectively (as far a...
Wed, Jul 12 2017, 4:26 PM
Mortgage rates had been holding in a narrow range near their highest levels in roughly 3 months over the past few days. Despite some stability in unde...
Wed, Jul 12 2017, 9:01 AM
Global bond markets have been on the run since June 27th , when Mario Draghi (head of the European Central Bank, or ECB) said deflation was being rep...
Tue, Jul 11 2017, 4:41 PM
Quite simply, markets are waiting for the last 3 days of this week before gleaning any "takeaways" about the current state of financial markets, the e...
Tue, Jul 11 2017, 3:44 PM
Mortgage rates remained in a very narrow range near their highest levels in roughly 3 months today. If you're into splitting hairs, we could discuss t...
Tue, Jul 11 2017, 9:17 AM
Bond markets (and stocks for that matter) have been stuck in narrow, sideways ranges over the past 4 trading sessions. This is a major departure fr...
Mon, Jul 10 2017, 5:57 PM
Bond markets were exceptionally quiet today. Even though trading levels were technically stronger than Friday, 10yr yields have remained in the sam...
Mon, Jul 10 2017, 5:24 PM
Mortgage rates improved somewhat today, on average, but the gains were modest. Some lenders were unchanged from Friday afternoon's latest levels. That...
Mon, Jul 10 2017, 9:51 AM
This week's economic calendar is fairly light, with no top tier reports until Thursday (Producer Prices) and Friday (CPI/Retail Sales). For what it's...
Fri, Jul 7 2017, 4:48 PM
NFP Friday is an institution for financial markets and especially the bond market. No other piece of monthly economic consistently has as big of an...
Fri, Jul 7 2017, 3:59 PM
Mortgage rates didn't move much higher today for most lenders. While that absence of additional weakness is "nice," the net effect is that rates remai...
Fri, Jul 7 2017, 8:25 AM
"NFP doesn't matter." These are bold words at times, a no-brainer at others, and a lucky guess most of the time. While NFP matters greatly in gener...
Thu, Jul 6 2017, 4:30 PM
We ended yesterday with a glimmer of hope for an end to the recent uptrend in rates. Even so, the modest gains were scarcely enough to defeat that ...
Thu, Jul 6 2017, 3:02 PM
Mortgage rates resumed their recent trend higher today. Yesterday had been the first day since June 27th without noticeable weakness--raising some hop...
Thu, Jul 6 2017, 9:26 AM
Treasuries were pummelled well before most domestic traders' left for the office this morning. 10yr yields were up to 2.37% (more than 4bps higher) b...
Wed, Jul 5 2017, 5:01 PM
Bond markets found their f irst green day since June 27th today and for no particular reason apart from today being the first full trading day in Jul...
Wed, Jul 5 2017, 4:15 PM
Mortgage rates had been rising at an uncomfortable pace since June 27th. As of Monday, the average conventional 30yr fixed rate quote was 0.125% highe...
Wed, Jul 5 2017, 9:08 AM
Today is light in terms of scheduled economic data and events. This will change rapidly over the next 2 days (ADP/ISM services tomorrow, followed...
Mon, Jul 3 2017, 3:02 PM
Bond markets closed early today (2pm ET) in observance of tomorrow's Independence Day holiday (and will be fully closed tomorrow). Fans of low rates ...
Mon, Jul 3 2017, 1:42 PM
Mortgage rates continue rising at an uncomfortable pace for anyone in the market to buy or refinance. Today was the 5th straight day of quicker-than-a...
Mon, Jul 3 2017, 9:39 AM
Every Friday, the CFTC issues a report on trading position in Treasury Futures (and everything else in the commodities futures/options complex). Here'...
Fri, Jun 30 2017, 4:53 PM
There is month-end bond buying and then there is month-end "position-squaring." These are 2 different things. Month-end bond-buying refers specifica...
Fri, Jun 30 2017, 3:43 PM
Mortgage rates moved higher for a 4th straight day to end the month of June. In terms of upward movement, this has been the worst week for mortgage ra...
Fri, Jun 30 2017, 9:11 AM
With bond yields so clearly lifting-off from their recent trend, today should be just another day to consider our relative demise. Being bullish on...
Thu, Jun 29 2017, 4:57 PM
If you follow equities markets much, you know that today was pretty ugly --especially for the tech sector. In fact, most equities analysts are blami...
Thu, Jun 29 2017, 4:08 PM
Mortgage rates are higher again today, with the average lender now back to levels not seen since May 16th, 2017. Unless you've been following every li...
Thu, Jun 29 2017, 9:29 AM
Even yesterday, the situation was already getting serious for bond markets given our past encounters with hints of tapering from major central banks. ...
Wed, Jun 28 2017, 5:31 PM
Today began in hilarious and somewhat glorious fashion with unnamed "ECB sources" overtly doing damage control on Draghi's comments that rocked bond...
Wed, Jun 28 2017, 4:39 PM
Mortgage rates moved moderately higher again today, as investors continued digesting the possibility of a "taper tantrum" in Europe. The US version of...
Wed, Jun 28 2017, 9:19 AM
Seemingly overnight (in fact, it WAS overnight yesterday), the notion of a European taper tantrum burst on the scene following comments from ECB Pre...
Tue, Jun 27 2017, 4:59 PM
Bond markets got sucker-punched today. Traders were on the lookout for Yellen's comments at a conference in London in the afternoon. Instead it wa...
