Bonds Drift Weaker Despite Lower Oil Prices
Although they still technically made positive progress versus the end of last week, bonds ended the day moderately weaker. Lower oil prices offered no support, but that's a tricky correlation these days. Longer-term oil contracts continue lining up with bond yield movement more reliably. To be sure, we can at least consider the impact of this morning's CPI data based on decent trading volume at the time and a reversal of the sideways to slightly stronger momentum in the preceding few hours, but it's impossible to say that it continued weighing on bonds for the rest of the session.
Econ Data / Events
m/m CORE CPI (Mar)
0.2% vs 0.3% f'cast, 0.2% prev
m/m Headline CPI (Mar)
0.9% vs 0.9% f'cast, 0.3% prev
y/y CORE CPI (Mar)
2.6% vs 2.7% f'cast, 2.5% prev
y/y Headline CPI (Mar)
3.3% vs 3.3% f'cast, 2.4% prev
Market Movement Recap
10:58 AM Slightly weaker this AM but leveling off with MBS unchanged and 10yr up 3bps at 4.306
12:46 PM weakest levels. MBS down 3 ticks (.09) and 10yr up 4.2bps at 4.319
03:35 PM flat for the past few hours with MBS down 2 ticks (.06) and 10yr up 4bps at 4.316
Mortgage Rates Remain Surprisingly Calm
If we’re splitting hairs, today’s average mortgage rates are technically higher than yesterday’s, but the change is so small that it’s just as fair to say that rates are flat. This closes out a week with surprisingly low volatility compared to that see…