Tue, Sep 12 2017, 4:10 PM
Mortgage rates continued higher at a reasonably abrupt pace today as last week's themes have been completely reversed. What themes are those? Generall...
Tue, Sep 12 2017, 8:53 AM
Yesterday was the warning shot and today could see confirmation that bonds are indeed bouncing. Actually, it's probably more appropriate to view ...
Mon, Sep 11 2017, 5:22 PM
Mortgage rates finally had a bad day , but everything's relative. This sort of bad day leaves the average lender quoting rates that would have been th...
Mon, Sep 11 2017, 5:22 PM
We'd been in the throes of a risk-related rally for several weeks that crescendoed last week on a combination of North Korea and natural disasters. ...
Mon, Sep 11 2017, 8:50 AM
Bond markets are beginning the week in a defensive stance after insurance analysts report expected Irma-related losses to be lower than originally f...
Fri, Sep 8 2017, 5:26 PM
With an absence of significant economic events and the storm of the century bearing down on the Southeast, trading activity was understandably a bit...
Fri, Sep 8 2017, 4:58 PM
Mortgage rates were slightly lower today, despite moderate weakness in underlying bond markets. This would typically coincide with higher rates, but m...
Fri, Sep 8 2017, 9:22 AM
Bonds have been on a tear recently , easily breaking to the lowest yields of the year this week after some exploratory attempts last week. Geopoliti...
Thu, Sep 7 2017, 4:31 PM
2 months ago, today's European Central Bank announcement looked like it would be a big deal insofar as it would be the venue for the ECB's first off...
Thu, Sep 7 2017, 3:06 PM
Mortgage rates didn't move much today, despite plenty of strength in underlying bond markets. This would normally coincide with lower rates, so what's...
Thu, Sep 7 2017, 8:17 AM
Ask me two months (or even a month ago) and I would have placed today above almost any other in terms of importance to the overall outlook. The rea...
Wed, Sep 6 2017, 4:56 PM
Bond markets began the day holding impressively sideways. Why impressive? Because there was a small laundry list of potential reasons for weakness...
Wed, Sep 6 2017, 4:55 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower this morning, more by way of catching up with yesterday's market movement than anything. Specifically, bond markets (which ...
Wed, Sep 6 2017, 9:16 AM
Until the onset of brinksmanship with North Korea and the appearance of big, back-to-back Hurricanes, financial markets were more focused on long-term...
Tue, Sep 5 2017, 5:01 PM
Bonds rallied significantly today on a confluence of news. Disparate events and headlines hit markets at just the right time and in just the right ...
Tue, Sep 5 2017, 4:04 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower today on a combination of factors. Chief among these were headlines over the weekend concerning more North Korean weapons t...
Tue, Sep 5 2017, 9:05 AM
Global financial markets moved away from risk to start the holiday-shortened week as more North Korean missile drama made the news over the weekend....
Fri, Sep 1 2017, 6:06 PM
We talk a lot about participation among traders dropping off at mid-day when European markets close, but today's version turned bond markets into a ve...
Fri, Sep 1 2017, 2:24 PM
Mortgage rates were sideways to slightly higher today despite a weak reading of the Employment Situation (aka "the jobs report"). This is traditionall...
Fri, Sep 1 2017, 8:30 AM
I wish Who Wants to be a Millionaire was still a popular show. Its catchphrases and terminology work really well with bond market psychology. Often ...
Thu, Aug 31 2017, 5:32 PM
Without month-end trading needs and in the absence of one of the most relevant inflation reports, today may well have been a typically slow summerti...
Thu, Aug 31 2017, 4:35 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower today--something they've been more likely to do in general since early July. The gradual downtrend brought them to their be...
Thu, Aug 31 2017, 8:34 AM
This week has admittedly been the same sort of summertime trading week that we've seen for most of July and August--perhaps even more so . By that I...
Wed, Aug 30 2017, 5:50 PM
Bond markets had a reasonably good day, all things considered. The caveat is that we shouldn't read much of anything into today's trading because i...
Wed, Aug 30 2017, 4:32 PM
Mortgage rates were technically higher today vs yesterday, but unless you've been following day-to-day movements under a microscope, you probably won'...
Wed, Aug 30 2017, 10:09 AM
We've seen it before and we'll likely see it again. Bond markets (and most other markets, for that matter) respond quickly to some unexpected headlin...
Tue, Aug 29 2017, 6:28 PM
It's all well and good to highlight North Korea's missile launch as the dominant market mover for the day. It absolutely was. But it takes a little ...
Tue, Aug 29 2017, 6:00 PM
It's one thing for the highly competitive environment of "rate table" advertising (where lenders compete and you get confused) to be reporting mortgag...
Tue, Aug 29 2017, 9:48 AM
Amid the recent slow summertime trading, there are only a few things that stand a chance of catching the market's collective eye. Somewhere near the ...
Mon, Aug 28 2017, 7:25 PM
It's not normal for a 5yr Treasury auction to cause the biggest move in any given day for bond markets. That's an honor typically reserved for 10yr...
Mon, Aug 28 2017, 5:32 PM
Mortgage rates held steady today, as the news cycle was dominated by Hurricane Harvey. That's not to say that natural disasters prevent movement in mo...
Mon, Aug 28 2017, 9:35 AM
Sometimes, events are such that the typical summertime trading patterns aren't easily seen in terms of trading ranges and volatility. For instance, i...
Fri, Aug 25 2017, 5:54 PM
Today's Jackson Hole symposium couldn't have been any more anticlimactic even if this year's topic were "How to Deliver Anticlimactic Speeches on Mone...
Fri, Aug 25 2017, 3:25 PM
Mortgage rates were unchanged today, on average. Some lenders were slightly better, others were slightly worse, but none were very far from yesterday'...
Fri, Aug 25 2017, 9:58 AM
I've waited until the day itself to abbreviate the Fed's Jackson Hole symposium with the beloved "J-Hole." Pretty impressive considering how much fun...
Thu, Aug 24 2017, 4:50 PM
Bond markets have been generally rallying since early July. The apparent inspiration for that rally was the sell-off that preceded it. That weakne...
Thu, Aug 24 2017, 2:35 PM
Mortgage rates haven't moved much at all recently. While that leaves us little to talk about if we're examining rate changes on a daily basis, it's a ...
Thu, Aug 24 2017, 9:22 AM
Most of my analysis in July and August focused on the positive technical boundary (aka "floor") at 2.21-2.22. As of yesterday, that floor is increasi...
Wed, Aug 23 2017, 5:26 PM
If there were a magical ratio comparing the overall movement in bond markets to the relevance of the factors motivating the movement, it would be off...
Wed, Aug 23 2017, 4:54 PM
Mortgage rates reversed yesterday's move today, falling back in line with recent lows--also the lowest levels since November 2016. At this time of yea...
Wed, Aug 23 2017, 9:25 AM
Coincidentally, yesterday's Day Ahead talked about "pivot points." Now today, we see a prime example of a pivot point in action. Although I labele...
Tue, Aug 22 2017, 4:23 PM
I'm not shy about dismissing the conventional wisdom of bond yields and stock prices following each other. We're talking about some iteration of th...
Tue, Aug 22 2017, 2:56 PM
Mortgage rates rose today, but by a small enough amount that it shouldn't crush too many hopes and dreams. For all intents and purposes, rates remain ...
Tue, Aug 22 2017, 10:32 AM
We have a dedicated primer on pivot points here . But let's look at a timely example with the pivot points we've been tracking in recent weeks. Act...
Mon, Aug 21 2017, 4:47 PM
It's a good thing financial media outlets aren't too shy about covering topics outside the financial sphere because without the eclipse, there would h...
Mon, Aug 21 2017, 4:10 PM
Mortgage rates held steady to start the new week. This keeps them in line with the best levels since November 2016. There were no interesting developm...
Mon, Aug 21 2017, 9:56 AM
Welcome! Here is a safe haven from all of the eclipse talk. It won't be mentioned at all in this article. Never mind that it's in the title and the...
Fri, Aug 18 2017, 8:20 PM
In the Day Ahead, we discussed bond traders' probable goals regarding keeping things as calm as possible. This depended on unexpected headlines and m...
Fri, Aug 18 2017, 7:54 PM
Mortgage rates moved lower again. Drama surrounding the Trump administration was also present. But this time around, the political theater wasn't resp...
Fri, Aug 18 2017, 7:34 AM
A maritime analogy for bond trading in the Summertime...
In the summer months especially, there's a boat-friendly baseline weather pattern offshore...
