Mon, Jan 23 2023, 4:15 PM
After hitting the lowest levels in 4 months at times over the past week, rates have drifted up a bit. There hasn't been much rhyme or reason behind t...
Mon, Jan 23 2023, 4:07 PM
Bonds Have a Case of The Mondays
Unlike the past 3 Mondays, which have seen fairly healthy participation and...
Mon, Jan 23 2023, 11:34 AM
Reduced to the most simplistic of considerations, bond market price movement is all about supply and demand. The same is true of just about anything ...
Mon, Jan 23 2023, 9:53 AM
Do you know what “splooting” is? Here’s a hint: 4-legged animals do it. (Hey, I don’t make these things up.) Quite the word. Words are very interestin...
Fri, Jan 20 2023, 5:03 PM
Bonds Retreat a Bit. No Compelling Reasons or Implications
Bonds rallied to the best levels in months ear...
Fri, Jan 20 2023, 1:01 PM
Since coming off the highest rates in more than a decade in November, bonds ran into resistance just before the end of the year. That resistance coin...
Fri, Jan 20 2023, 12:20 PM
Existing home sales fell back for the 11th straight month in December according to the National Association of Realtors® (NAR) The month’s sales of ...
Fri, Jan 20 2023, 10:17 AM
What would this opening paragraph be without some fun, non-mortgage stuff? Watch a rare livestream of bald eagles nesting on eggs in California. 32 tr...
Thu, Jan 19 2023, 4:04 PM
If you cross paths with the average mortgage rate article (or tweet/post/etc) today, chances are you'll see some mention of "rates moving lower." Tha...
Thu, Jan 19 2023, 3:51 PM
Here's What's Up With These Big Swings in MBS Prices
Thursday ended up being a boring, uneventful trading da...
Thu, Jan 19 2023, 1:21 PM
In a single moment, the fees for a vast majority of new mortgages in the US have changed. In some cases, the changes are drastic, both for better and...
Thu, Jan 19 2023, 11:41 AM
So much illiquidity this week... But what does that really mean? Let's break it down...
There are buyers and sellers in the MBS market submitting "...
Thu, Jan 19 2023, 9:37 AM
“Wet” January is going well for me. Wait… did I get that wrong? If food news is more to your liking, Krispy Kreme has rolled out donuts covered in Bis...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 4:28 PM
Mortgage rates moved down at a fairly quick pace today following a slew of rate-friendly headlines. Technically, the headlines were good for the bond...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 4:20 PM
Big Rally Challenges Range Floor. What Next?
Bonds started strong in the overnight session thanks to an unch...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 4:16 PM
A friend out in California asked me how much, on average, I spend on a bottle of wine. I replied, “About half an hour.” Plenty of wine is being consum...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 11:55 AM
There was a fair amount of anticipation over the most recent policy announcement from the Bank of Japan (BOJ) which came out early in the overnight se...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 11:02 AM
On top of the solid report on mortgage volume earlier today, comes another hopeful report from the construction industry. The National Association of ...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 9:49 AM
A friend out in California asked me how much, on average, I spend on a bottle of wine. I replied, “About half an hour.” Plenty of wine is being consum...
Wed, Jan 18 2023, 9:41 AM
loan application volume, increased 27.9 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis The Refinance Index rose 34 percent week-over-week but remains 81 p...
Tue, Jan 17 2023, 3:59 PM
Limited Market Motivations as Traders Wait to Fill in Blanks
There was a palpable absence of relevant source...
Tue, Jan 17 2023, 3:39 PM
The holiday-shortened week sees mortgage rates starting out slightly higher when compared to the end of last week. Versus any other day in the past 4...
Tue, Jan 17 2023, 12:15 PM
By the middle of December, bond yields made a convincing move down from decades-long highs and settled in a sideways range on CPI/Fed week. We re-ent...
Tue, Jan 17 2023, 9:19 AM
Carol K. writes, “Back in my day there was so much cheap toilet paper and eggs that we would throw them at the houses of our enemies.” And then there’...
Fri, Jan 13 2023, 4:50 PM
Mortgage rates officially hit their lowest levels in 4 months after this week's inflation data. Despite the recent progress, Fed officials continue to...
Fri, Jan 13 2023, 3:30 PM
Incidental Weakness Today, But Let's Focus on The Bigger Picture
Bonds tried to stage a mid-day rally, but e...
Fri, Jan 13 2023, 12:26 PM
Recently, the bond market's job description seems to be almost entirely focused on reacting to CPI and then waiting for the next one. Perhaps we can ...
Fri, Jan 13 2023, 9:15 AM
“When cannibals ate a missionary, they got a taste of religion.” In late 2022 vendors and lenders had a taste of the first part of 2023, and it isn’t ...
Thu, Jan 12 2023, 4:46 PM
Today brought the scheduled monthly release of the Consumer Price Index (CPI). Of all the monthly economic reports, this one has had the biggest impa...
Thu, Jan 12 2023, 4:15 PM
Bonds Finally Decide They Liked Today's Inflation Numbers
You won't see too many days with a 10+ bp rally in...
Thu, Jan 12 2023, 10:30 AM
CPI came out very much in line with forecasts. We'd discussed the possibility of threading the needle in terms of financial markets not moving much i...
Thu, Jan 12 2023, 9:09 AM
“Thirty years ago, we had Bob Hope, Johnny Cash, and Steve Jobs. Today we have no hope, no cash, and no jobs. We are all praying nothing happens to Ke...
Wed, Jan 11 2023, 3:31 PM
Mortgage rates are based primarily on the prices and yields of bonds. Bonds take cues from several places, but always from inflation and the economy-...
Wed, Jan 11 2023, 3:19 PM
Consolidation Takes Friendly Turn Ahead of CPI
Our focus this week has been on the notion of consolidation a...
Wed, Jan 11 2023, 10:46 AM
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) spent nearly a decade being ignored as a market mover due to an absence of any interesting momentum in inflation. That...
Wed, Jan 11 2023, 9:52 AM
Ever been to Noma in Denmark? Me neither, although I did some solo bicycling there, which is so much more reliable than flying domestically this morni...
Wed, Jan 11 2023, 8:10 AM
Overall mortgage application activity returned to pre-holiday levels during the first week of the new year. Lower interest rates bolstered refinancing...
Tue, Jan 10 2023, 4:12 PM
MBS Outperform as Treasuries Get Hit by Issuance
By 4pm, 5.0 MBS are only down a hair over an eighth of a po...
Tue, Jan 10 2023, 3:51 PM
After coming close to the lowest levels in 4 months yesterday, mortgage rates bounced slightly higher today. There's never any way to know exactly wh...
Tue, Jan 10 2023, 12:04 PM
"Circling the wagons" isn't a particularly specific term in the realm of financial market commentary. It's just a simple way to say that bonds had be...
Tue, Jan 10 2023, 10:37 AM
“Someone asked me to name two structures that hold water. I was like, well, damn.” As the storms continue to hit us in Northern California and Nevada,...
Mon, Jan 9 2023, 3:43 PM
Last Friday was a great day for mortgage rates with two important economic reports helping the bond market make serious gains (read more). Mortgage le...
Mon, Jan 9 2023, 3:32 PM
Decent Day Helps Legitimize Friday's Gains
Any time we see a strong move on NFP Friday with a hint of "snowb...
Mon, Jan 9 2023, 11:32 AM
Last week brought a series of economic reports that took the bond market in both directions. Thursday's data pushed yields somewhat higher, but Frida...
Mon, Jan 9 2023, 10:30 AM
Attorneys across the nation have taken note that the Federal Trade Commission has proposed a rule that would bar companies from requiring employees to...
Fri, Jan 6 2023, 4:50 PM
The Federal Reserve (aka "The Fed") has a parrot problem, and it's on a crash course with economic reality... maybe. The Fed sets policies that impac...
Fri, Jan 6 2023, 4:49 PM
ISM and NFP Team Up To Send Rates Sharply Lower
Bonds got off to a strong start today when the wage componen...
Fri, Jan 6 2023, 10:07 AM
This is about the time you stop saying “Happy New Year” to people because you’ve forgotten who you’ve said it to and who you haven’t. Lenders and vend...
Fri, Jan 6 2023, 9:50 AM
Here's a puzzler--at least at first glance. This morning's much-anticipated jobs report came out stronger than expected with nonfarm payrolls at 223k...
Thu, Jan 5 2023, 3:32 PM
The most basic way to think about interest rate movement is to assume that a strong economy pushes rates higher and vice versa. There are many other ...
