Fri, Sep 19 2025, 3:31 PM
Uneventfully Sideways At Modestly Weaker Levels
Friday ended up being the least interesting day of the week ...
Fri, Sep 19 2025, 11:23 AM
In your defense, perhaps you're not too bothered or concerned about the market/rate movement since Fed day. But if you are, here's some perspective. W...
Thu, Sep 18 2025, 3:40 PM
It's day two of mortgage rates surging higher--now back to the highest levels in 2 weeks (the day before the September 5th jobs report). The juxtaposi...
Thu, Sep 18 2025, 4:36 PM
Will September Deja Vu Continue?
Rates rallied hard into last September 2024's Fed rate cut and then bounced...
Thu, Sep 18 2025, 11:48 AM
JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and Bank of America, PNC Bank, N.A. and others announced a decrease in its prime lending rate to 7.25 percent, ...
Thu, Sep 18 2025, 9:28 AM
This morning's economic reports (jobless claims and Philly Fed) are not notoriously big market movers, but many analysts gave ample credit to Claims f...
Wed, Sep 17 2025, 4:44 PM
Powell Press Conference Trumps The Dots, Sparking Moderate Sell-Off
Of today's Fed events (rate announcement...
Wed, Sep 17 2025, 3:53 PM
Several things happen on Fed Day--especially on the 4 out of 8 examples with updated rate forecasts from Fed members. The official announcement of a ...
Wed, Sep 17 2025, 2:00 PM
Although swings in net exports continue to affect the data, recent Recent indicators suggest that growth of economic activity moderated in the first...
Wed, Sep 17 2025, 11:41 AM
Today I find myself in Vancouver, WA, splendid in the autumn, to meet with various mortgage folks and especially the Banner Bank mortgage crew, coveri...
Wed, Sep 17 2025, 10:51 AM
The Fed rate announcement is at 2pm ET. A single 25bp rate cut is fully priced in to the bond market and that cut will not be responsible for any vola...
Tue, Sep 16 2025, 4:03 PM
Big Shift Toward 5.0 Coupons Continues
Mortgage rates have lurched rapidly lower in September as 5.0 UMBS ha...
Tue, Sep 16 2025, 3:18 PM
Mortgage rates dropped sharply lower today relative to the amount of movement in the underlying bond market with the average lender right in line with...
Tue, Sep 16 2025, 11:49 AM
My cat Myrtle was always up for a battle with a lizard in the yard. On a larger scale, the ancient Chinese philosopher Sun Tzu said, “Every battle is ...
Tue, Sep 16 2025, 10:02 AM
After last week's CPI data was taken mostly in stride, the only other potential economic data hurdle was this morning's Retail Sales report. Whereas C...
Mon, Sep 15 2025, 3:47 PM
Uneventful Rally. Retail Sales on Deck
Bonds began the week on a stronger note, but not for any glaringly ob...
Mon, Sep 15 2025, 3:12 PM
Mortgage rates have done almost nothing but move lower over the past 4 months. The first Fridays in August and September account for about half of the...
Mon, Sep 15 2025, 11:53 AM
“Someone posted that they had just made synonym buns. I replied, ‘You mean just like the ones that grammar used to make?’ I am now blocked.” That was ...
Mon, Sep 15 2025, 11:25 AM
For all the time we spend pushing back on the notion that the Fed Funds Rate is a root cause for volatility in longer-term rates, that push-back alway...
Fri, Sep 12 2025, 3:43 PM
Incidental, Inconsequential Weakness Ahead of Fed Week
Bonds began the day in modestly weaker territory and ...
Fri, Sep 12 2025, 3:20 PM
The underlying bond market (which dictates the rates offered by mortgage lenders) weakened moderately overnight. Weaker bonds equate to higher rates,...
Fri, Sep 12 2025, 11:38 AM
“Rob, we’ve said ‘no’ to more expansion possibilities than ever before. Are you hearing other lenders doing deep dives on LOs and branches and also no...
Fri, Sep 12 2025, 11:11 AM
Bonds began the week with 10yr at 4.07 before rallying down to 4.04 by Monday's close. Now on Friday, we're opening at 4.06 and we haven't spent much...
Thu, Sep 11 2025, 4:25 PM
Very Calm Reaction But Not Too Surprising
One could argue that CPI is the next biggest potential market move...
Thu, Sep 11 2025, 3:51 PM
Today's inflation report (the Consumer Price Index or CPI) certainly had a chance to create volatility for rates, but things ended up staying fairly c...
Thu, Sep 11 2025, 12:10 PM
It's an interesting morning for economic data and the bond market's reaction. At face value, CPI was mostly in line with forecasts, but unrounded num...
Thu, Sep 11 2025, 11:41 AM
“All I know is what I read in the papers,” Will Rogers quipped. In news in the papers from our Census Bureau, AI use at large companies is in decline....
Wed, Sep 10 2025, 4:28 PM
Helpful Data and Treasury Auction Set High Bar For CPI
Another fairly straightforward day for the bond marke...
Wed, Sep 10 2025, 4:02 PM
Wednesday brought the first of this week's two key inflation reports. While the Producer Price Index (PPI) is the lesser of the two in terms of potent...
Wed, Sep 10 2025, 11:46 AM
“Rob, I hate it when mom and dad fight. Will this Pulte/Bessent, FHFA/Treasury tussle impact mortgage rates?” Probably not; it hasn’t so far. Director...
Wed, Sep 10 2025, 11:34 AM
Mortgage applications jumped 9.2% last week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s survey for the week ending September 5, 2025. The results...
Wed, Sep 10 2025, 11:27 AM
Of the two inflation reports out this week, PPI is the lesser of the two in terms of importance, but it came in far enough below forecasts to prompt s...
Tue, Sep 9 2025, 4:04 PM
Post-NFP Rally Momentum Fades
When bonds string together several successive days of improvement, the probabi...
Tue, Sep 9 2025, 3:19 PM
It had to happen at some point. After spending 4 straight days of setting new 11-month lows, mortgage rates finally moved higher today, but the headli...
Tue, Sep 9 2025, 11:42 AM
Tomorrow I head from Boise to Jackson for the Mississippi Mortgage Banker’s Fall Conference. Certainly a topic in my email in-box and at events is how...
Tue, Sep 9 2025, 10:31 AM
On August 1st, Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP) not only came out weaker than expected, but the previous two reports were also revised significantly lower. This...
Mon, Sep 8 2025, 3:34 PM
To their credit, most mortgage lenders did an admirable job of aggressively pricing-in the bond market rally after last Friday's jobs report. Many mor...
Mon, Sep 8 2025, 3:33 PM
More Gains Despite Absence of New Motivation
There's not much to say about Monday other than "we'll take it!...
Mon, Sep 8 2025, 11:43 AM
“When the economy is good, people drink. When the economy is bad, people drink. The moral? Invest in alcohol.” Here in Boise at the PNMLC, the comment...
Fri, Sep 5 2025, 4:44 PM
Textbook Reaction With Minimal Volatility
The bond market's reaction to today's jobs report was a textbook e...
Fri, Sep 5 2025, 12:32 PM
It may seem like today's bond market movement alone (3/8ths higher in MBS and 0.09% in 10yr yields) doesn't explain the pace of improvement in mortgag...
Fri, Sep 5 2025, 11:51 AM
It's a well-known fact that the monthly jobs report is more capable of causing big reactions in rates than any other economic data. It happened last m...
Fri, Sep 5 2025, 11:29 AM
The Fed looks at Twitter to gauge the financial sentiment out there? Yes: TFSI! The Federal Reserve certainly finds itself in a maelstrom these days… ...
Fri, Sep 5 2025, 9:07 AM
It's a fairly straightforward morning with NFP coming in much weaker than expected with additional net-negative revisions to the previous 2 months. Th...
Thu, Sep 4 2025, 3:54 PM
Bonds Positioning For Weaker NFP?
One of the best things to understand about the jobs report is that the pay...
Thu, Sep 4 2025, 3:22 PM
The jobs report is the most important scheduled event each month as far as interest rates are concerned. The last installment helped get the average 3...
Thu, Sep 4 2025, 11:46 AM
“Apparently you can’t use ‘beef stew’ as a password. It’s not stroganoff.” How’s your privacy? Or another question: Why wouldn’t you tell your recent ...
Thu, Sep 4 2025, 10:33 AM
Thursday morning's slate of econ data was the most active of the week with claims, layoffs, ADP, and ISM Services (also the Trade Gap and Labor Costs,...
Wed, Sep 3 2025, 4:21 PM
Straightforward Data-Driven Rally
It proved to be an incredibly straightforward day for the bond market. Tr...
Wed, Sep 3 2025, 3:42 PM
October 3rd is a date that has come up many times in the past month of mortgage rate coverage. That's because there's been a veritable chasm between t...
