Fri, Feb 7 2025, 10:15 AM
As always, the jobs report matters. Today, we're seeing an obvious reaction to a fairly minimal miss (143k vs 170k f'cast in the headline job count). ...
Thu, Feb 6 2025, 3:20 PM
Yesterday was notable for being the first day in more than a week to offer any excitement for rates. More notably, that excitement was the good kind....
Thu, Feb 6 2025, 11:51 AM
“Nothing says, ‘I mean business’ than using a shopping cart at the liquor store.” We’re already 10 percent through with 2025, and residential lenders ...
Thu, Feb 6 2025, 9:42 AM
Coming off yesterday's solid rally, the bond market underwent a modest correction in the overnight session. Most of the gains remain intact, but the ...
Wed, Feb 5 2025, 4:03 PM
Nice Win For Bonds With Help From Data
There are plenty of moving pieces at the moment when it comes to assi...
Wed, Feb 5 2025, 3:35 PM
There are two main styles of measurement when it comes to keeping track of mortgage rates: daily and weekly. Sometimes, the differences in methodolog...
Wed, Feb 5 2025, 2:55 PM
The recent absence of volatility in day-to-day mortgage rate movement has been an easy target for light-hearted indignation among market watchers. Bu...
Wed, Feb 5 2025, 11:40 AM
I know where to go when this Commentary writing gig grows stale. Wanna make 30 clams an hour? Costco’s hiring! (Remember when lenders and originators ...
Wed, Feb 5 2025, 10:40 AM
To say the very least, there are more moving pieces to consider at the moment when it comes to the narrative guiding volatility and momentum in the bo...
Tue, Feb 4 2025, 4:39 PM
Bonds Rally Back to Prevailing Range
The only moderately inconvenient part of the day was the morning hours ...
Tue, Feb 4 2025, 4:26 PM
If you like your mortgage rate movement boring and minimal, this week's for you (and last week, and the week before that). Going all the way back to ...
Tue, Feb 4 2025, 11:46 AM
How’s your ability to predict the weather? Apparently not good if you’re a groundhog. It is not hard to predict how you’ll hear from the IRS, if you d...
Tue, Feb 4 2025, 10:32 AM
Bonds initially drifted into slightly weaker territory in the overnight session, but began bouncing back just after 9am ET. All this in spite of a qu...
Mon, Feb 3 2025, 4:21 PM
In-Range Volatility on Tariff Headlines, But Broadly Sideways
If you are following along with intraday marke...
Mon, Feb 3 2025, 4:10 PM
We know that mortgage rates are driven by financial markets and we know that financial markets have experienced volatility amid the roll-out of new ta...
Mon, Feb 3 2025, 11:52 AM
Where should we begin this week? There’s President Trump making good on one of his campaign promises over the weekend, and it wasn’t ending Russia’s a...
Mon, Feb 3 2025, 10:45 AM
As we discussed heading into the weekend (and the likely official tariff announcement), the only recent, conclusive track record the market has for ta...
Fri, Jan 31 2025, 5:01 PM
Reasonably Reserved Reaction to Tariff Headlines
If you were just watching headlines and making note of MBS ...
Fri, Jan 31 2025, 4:33 PM
For all of the news that seems to be highly likely to cause volatility for rates, the market reaction ended up playing out on a very small scale. The ...
Fri, Jan 31 2025, 12:16 PM
This morning's PCE inflation data was in line with expectations with the annual core PCE price index coming in at 2.8% and the monthly core coming in ...
Fri, Jan 31 2025, 12:02 PM
Here in Las Vegas, I asked a German girl if Germans are afraid of numbers. She said 9. Numbers are interesting, as we will find out with the declared ...
Thu, Jan 30 2025, 4:41 PM
Solid Showing In Spite of Data and Uncertainty
The relevance of economic data increased this morning with th...
Thu, Jan 30 2025, 4:08 PM
Interest rates are driven by the bond market and bonds are at their best levels in over a month. As such, it's no surprise that mortgage rates are abl...
Thu, Jan 30 2025, 3:24 PM
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) released its Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI) for December this morning. Pending sales measures the number ...
Thu, Jan 30 2025, 12:09 PM
Bonds rallied in overnight trading. The move was exceptionally linear, without any obvious regard for movement in equities or European bonds. Yields w...
Thu, Jan 30 2025, 11:54 AM
Any capital markets person will tell you, “What’s a surefire way to double your money in a casino? Fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.” I ...
Wed, Jan 29 2025, 4:26 PM
Uneventful Fed Day, Bonds Eventually Agree
There's never a way to know with certainty that a Fed announcemen...
Wed, Jan 29 2025, 3:47 PM
Heading into today's Fed announcement, we didn't expect to receive any significant surprise on the stance of monetary policy. Financial markets had l...
Wed, Jan 29 2025, 3:27 PM
“Did you ever notice that when you put the two words "The" and "IRS" together, it spells "Theirs"? The impact of taxes and tax cuts (potential or expi...
Wed, Jan 29 2025, 2:01 PM
What follows is a comparison between today's newly released Fed announcement and the previous announcement. Additions are blue/underlined. Subtractio...
Wed, Jan 29 2025, 12:12 PM
Bonds began the day in slightly stronger territory but have pulled back as we head into the noon hour. If we put today's movement under a microscope,...
Tue, Jan 28 2025, 4:23 PM
Not Expecting Fireworks From The Fed
Bonds had a mixed reaction to this morning's Durable Goods data with st...
Tue, Jan 28 2025, 3:22 PM
Both S&P Case-Shiller and the FHFA released national home price indices this morning. In both cases, November's prices were slightly higher than expec...
Tue, Jan 28 2025, 3:07 PM
The average mortgage lender remained right in line with yesterday's levels despite a bit of weakness in the bond market. Lenders who improved their r...
Tue, Jan 28 2025, 11:44 AM
“Last year I joined a support group for procrastinators. We haven't met yet.” Lenders and vendors are certainly meeting here in Austin. What’s going o...
Tue, Jan 28 2025, 9:02 AM
Bonds were weaker overnight as markets calmed down a bit after yesterday's DeepSeek frenzy. The 8:20am CME open brought in just a bit of buying, but ...
Mon, Jan 27 2025, 4:53 PM
Bonds Seek Lower Yields, But not Too Deeply Yet
On Friday night, a vast majority of market watchers had neve...
Mon, Jan 27 2025, 3:47 PM
There are two distinct patterns of behavior when it comes to rates interacting with stocks. The first could be called the "conventional wisdom" patte...
Mon, Jan 27 2025, 11:54 AM
“Dr. Oz says rubbing coffee grounds on your naked body will get rid of cellulite. Apparently, you can't do this in the downtown Austin Starbucks.” Her...
Mon, Jan 27 2025, 10:18 AM
NVDA has obviously been THE biggest driver of prevailing bull market in stocks. In 2024, its market cap increased by just over 2 trillion dollars. Fol...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 4:27 PM
Modest Gains Make For an Uneventful Week
If bonds had continued to sell off today, it would have made the we...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 3:46 PM
While there were only 4 business days instead of the customary 5, it's been an intensely boring week for mortgage rates. Tuesday started out right wh...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 3:16 PM
It's no mystery that 2024 hasn't been a stellar year for home sales and many other housing metrics. Today's release of December's Existing Home Sales ...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 2:52 PM
The Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) weekly mortgage application survey showed a modest decrease in refinance applications and an even more modest...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 12:03 PM
Due to the incredibly light calendar of economic data this week, this morning's combination of S&P PMI and Consumer Sentiment added up to the most con...
Fri, Jan 24 2025, 11:47 AM
“With oil prices going down, I’ll demand that interest rates drop immediately. And likewise, they should be dropping all over the world. Interest rate...
Thu, Jan 23 2025, 4:42 PM
Bonds Feeling Defensive Despite Trump's Demands For Lower Rates
Bonds lost ground this morning despite sligh...
Thu, Jan 23 2025, 3:39 PM
After several consecutive days without any noticeable changes, mortgage rates finally made a move today. Unfortunately, that move was higher. Thankfu...
Thu, Jan 23 2025, 11:54 AM
“Be decisive. Right or wrong, make a decision. The road is paved with flat squirrels who couldn’t make a decision.” Potential borrowers wonder why mor...
Thu, Jan 23 2025, 10:45 AM
Yesterday's recap began by calling attention to the "extreme dearth of big ticket economic data" this week. Thursday AM brought the weekly jobless cl...
