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7th August, 25
Fairly Resilient Despite Bumpy Auction
Fairly Resilient Despite Bumpy Auction The relevant morning econ data was limited to Jobless Claims. While the weekly and continuing numbers were both higher than expected, it wasn't a big enough miss to spark any sort of decisive rally in bonds. MBS lost ground heading into the PM hours and lost some more ground after a poorly received 30yr bond auction. But whereas the auction could have been used as a front for additional selling, bonds generally did a decent job of holding their ground in the last few hours of the day. Friday's calendar is empty. This doesn't mean we won't see any
Fairly Resilient Despite Bumpy Auction
Fairly Resilient Despite Bumpy Auction The relevant morning econ data was limited to Jobless Claims. While the weekly and continuing numbers were both higher than expected, it wasn't a big enough miss to spark any sort of decisive rally in bonds. MBS lost ground heading into the PM hours and lost some more ground after a poorly received 30yr bond auction. But whereas the auction could have been used as a front for additional selling, bonds generally did a decent job of holding their ground in the last few hours of the day. Friday's calendar is empty. This doesn't mean we won't see any
7th August, 25
Mortgage Rates Hit Another New Longer-Term Low
Mortgage rates have barely budged after Monday with the day-over-day change failing to exceed 0.02% on any given day. But today's budging happened to bring the average 30yr fixed rate to another 10-month low. Lenders are in the mid 6% range for top tier scenarios. Economic data is one of the common influences for the bonds that underly rate movement. Today's only somewhat significant report was the weekly jobless claims data. It would have needed to fall very far from forecasts in order to have a big impact. While it was higher than expected, the "miss" was too small to matter.
Mortgage Rates Hit Another New Longer-Term Low
Mortgage rates have barely budged after Monday with the day-over-day change failing to exceed 0.02% on any given day. But today's budging happened to bring the average 30yr fixed rate to another 10-month low. Lenders are in the mid 6% range for top tier scenarios. Economic data is one of the common influences for the bonds that underly rate movement. Today's only somewhat significant report was the weekly jobless claims data. It would have needed to fall very far from forecasts in order to have a big impact. While it was higher than expected, the "miss" was too small to matter.
7th August, 25
Loan Delivery, Warehouse, Compliance Webinar, Workflow Tools; Correspondent News
We’re back traveling and packing for the plethora of conferences. Packing and intellect sometimes collide: for the life of me, I can’t seem to grasp this simple video on the moves of how to fold a t-shirt in under two seconds. (It is worth waiting out the ad; show it to your kids.) The Fed doesn’t set mortgage rates, but the markets seem focused on its every move and opinion since its mandate of maximum employment, price stability, and steady inflation is always precarious. The Fed is often a topic on The Big Picture, but this week Katie Sweeney, EVP of Broker Strategy and Advocacy at
Loan Delivery, Warehouse, Compliance Webinar, Workflow Tools; Correspondent News
We’re back traveling and packing for the plethora of conferences. Packing and intellect sometimes collide: for the life of me, I can’t seem to grasp this simple video on the moves of how to fold a t-shirt in under two seconds. (It is worth waiting out the ad; show it to your kids.) The Fed doesn’t set mortgage rates, but the markets seem focused on its every move and opinion since its mandate of maximum employment, price stability, and steady inflation is always precarious. The Fed is often a topic on The Big Picture, but this week Katie Sweeney, EVP of Broker Strategy and Advocacy at
7th August, 25
Another Sideways Start Amid Uninspiring Data
The week's last hope for any signs of life from economic data has come and gone with this morning's Jobless Claims. To be fair, there was never really much of a chance for this particular data to inspire any significant reaction in bonds. There may be signs of weakness in the labor market, but they're not readily seen in claims data because the weakness isn't a result of people losing jobs as much as it about not finding jobs. In that sense, the continuing claims portion of the jobless claims report is sort of capturing the phenomenon (i.e. weekly initial claims shows no
Another Sideways Start Amid Uninspiring Data
The week's last hope for any signs of life from economic data has come and gone with this morning's Jobless Claims. To be fair, there was never really much of a chance for this particular data to inspire any significant reaction in bonds. There may be signs of weakness in the labor market, but they're not readily seen in claims data because the weakness isn't a result of people losing jobs as much as it about not finding jobs. In that sense, the continuing claims portion of the jobless claims report is sort of capturing the phenomenon (i.e. weekly initial claims shows no
6th August, 25
More Ground-Holding Despite Weird Intraday Spike
More Ground-Holding Despite Weird Intraday Spike This morning's commentary led with our desire to avoid jinxing this week's flat, boring market movement with rates at long term lows. But for a few minutes mid-day, it looked like the jinx was real. At 11:35am, yields shot 3bps higher in a matter of minutes and in exceptionally heavy volume. Several hours later and there are still no solid explanations for the mini-drama. Thankfully, explanations are less important after Treasuries fully erased the mid-day weakness. Mystery moves like this happen. They usually offer clues by
More Ground-Holding Despite Weird Intraday Spike
More Ground-Holding Despite Weird Intraday Spike This morning's commentary led with our desire to avoid jinxing this week's flat, boring market movement with rates at long term lows. But for a few minutes mid-day, it looked like the jinx was real. At 11:35am, yields shot 3bps higher in a matter of minutes and in exceptionally heavy volume. Several hours later and there are still no solid explanations for the mini-drama. Thankfully, explanations are less important after Treasuries fully erased the mid-day weakness. Mystery moves like this happen. They usually offer clues by
6th August, 25
Mortgage Rates Steadily Holding Longer-Term Lows
Although there were flashes of potential volatility in the underlying bond market at times today, mortgage rates made it through unscathed. In other words, the volatility wasn't sufficient to force the average lender to make mid-day changes to the rates they decided to offer this morning. Whereas yesterday saw an inconsequentially small increase of 0.01% to the average conventional 30yr fixed rate, today saw just the opposite. That means our rate index once again matches its lowest level since October 4th, 2024. While this is undoubtedly a victory, rates would need to fall
Mortgage Rates Steadily Holding Longer-Term Lows
Although there were flashes of potential volatility in the underlying bond market at times today, mortgage rates made it through unscathed. In other words, the volatility wasn't sufficient to force the average lender to make mid-day changes to the rates they decided to offer this morning. Whereas yesterday saw an inconsequentially small increase of 0.01% to the average conventional 30yr fixed rate, today saw just the opposite. That means our rate index once again matches its lowest level since October 4th, 2024. While this is undoubtedly a victory, rates would need to fall
6th August, 25
DPA, HELOC, Document, Non-QM, Pooling Products; Conf. Conventional Changes
As the MMLA event wrapped up in Michigan, a large number of people around the nation (and some from here) are gearing up to travel to (or within) California to attend the California MBA’s Western Secondary and then FAMP’s annual convention in Orlando. The number of conferences is skyrocketing. Numbers are a big part of our industry, and this morning’s MBA application data reflected what I am hearing from MLOs around the nation. (Today’s L1 2PM ET interview features veteran broker Brian Benjamin discussing what he’s seeing.) Joel Kan writes, “The refinance share of mortgage activity
DPA, HELOC, Document, Non-QM, Pooling Products; Conf. Conventional Changes
As the MMLA event wrapped up in Michigan, a large number of people around the nation (and some from here) are gearing up to travel to (or within) California to attend the California MBA’s Western Secondary and then FAMP’s annual convention in Orlando. The number of conferences is skyrocketing. Numbers are a big part of our industry, and this morning’s MBA application data reflected what I am hearing from MLOs around the nation. (Today’s L1 2PM ET interview features veteran broker Brian Benjamin discussing what he’s seeing.) Joel Kan writes, “The refinance share of mortgage activity
6th August, 25
Super Calm Post-NFP Week Continues
We don't want to jinx it, but this is turning out to be an uncommonly calm week of trading compared to other post-jobs-report trading weeks. So far, it's on track to have the narrowest range and the lowest week-over-week change of any recent example, regardless of the size of the NFP reaction. There's not much to say about the market in the absence of movement or relevant data. Today's only possibly noteworthy event is the 10yr Treasury auction, and that's a stretch. If we really strain to assign meaning, we could draw some conclusions about underlying bond trading sentiment based
Super Calm Post-NFP Week Continues
We don't want to jinx it, but this is turning out to be an uncommonly calm week of trading compared to other post-jobs-report trading weeks. So far, it's on track to have the narrowest range and the lowest week-over-week change of any recent example, regardless of the size of the NFP reaction. There's not much to say about the market in the absence of movement or relevant data. Today's only possibly noteworthy event is the 10yr Treasury auction, and that's a stretch. If we really strain to assign meaning, we could draw some conclusions about underlying bond trading sentiment based
5th August, 25
Bonds Hold Steady After Modest Data-Driven Rally
Bonds Hold Steady After Modest Data-Driven Rally Today's (and to be fair, this week's) only major econ data--ISM Services--was a mixed blessing for bonds this morning. The only headwind was the uptick in the inflation component to another post-pandemic high. The tailwinds involved all other components suggesting a mild economic deceleration. Traders ultimately gave more weight to the latter. Bonds were slightly weaker before the data, but ended the day closer to unchanged levels. MBS outperformed, presumably due to Treasuries facing down another week of heavy auction supply.
Bonds Hold Steady After Modest Data-Driven Rally
Bonds Hold Steady After Modest Data-Driven Rally Today's (and to be fair, this week's) only major econ data--ISM Services--was a mixed blessing for bonds this morning. The only headwind was the uptick in the inflation component to another post-pandemic high. The tailwinds involved all other components suggesting a mild economic deceleration. Traders ultimately gave more weight to the latter. Bonds were slightly weaker before the data, but ended the day closer to unchanged levels. MBS outperformed, presumably due to Treasuries facing down another week of heavy auction supply.
5th August, 25
Mortgage Rates Holding at 10 Month Lows
Yesterday saw the average 30yr fixed rate fall back in line with levels from early October, 2024. This happened for two reasons. The broader, underlying reason is that rates have been in a fairly narrow, stable range and that range was already relatively closer to 10 month lows than 10 month highs. The more specific reason is quite clearly the market's reaction to last week's jobs report. In other words, the prevailing range was the fuel and the jobs report was the match. Little has changed so far in the present week as far as the underlying bond market is concerned. Mortgage rates
Mortgage Rates Holding at 10 Month Lows
Yesterday saw the average 30yr fixed rate fall back in line with levels from early October, 2024. This happened for two reasons. The broader, underlying reason is that rates have been in a fairly narrow, stable range and that range was already relatively closer to 10 month lows than 10 month highs. The more specific reason is quite clearly the market's reaction to last week's jobs report. In other words, the prevailing range was the fuel and the jobs report was the match. Little has changed so far in the present week as far as the underlying bond market is concerned. Mortgage rates
