2 Straight Days of Gains?! Not only have bonds managed to pull off a feat rarely seen in recent memory (back to back days of solid gains), but the total drop in yields is the biggest since August 2024.  Today's improvement wasn't nearly as big as yesterday's CPI-driven rally, but... Read more

Do you know the interest rate on your loan? How about the age of your roof? Here in Austin, a big concern is too much growth: Austin has gained 1 million people in the last 15 years. Sprawl, traffic, and new construction have become the name of the game. As... Read more

While it was never going to be on the same level as yesterday's CPI in terms of market movement potential, Retail Sales was likely to be today's most relevant data. The early price action confirmed that.  Jobless Claims and Philly Fed were stronger than expected. Retail Sales was the only... Read more

CPI Lived Up To Market Moving Potential And Then Some For every 14 or 15 times we approach a potential big-ticket market mover with a high degree of anticipation, days like today happen.  In fact, it might be even more rare than that because bonds reacted even more forcefully than... Read more

The folks here in Austin are sarcastically asking, “Who’s in your wallet?” Hopefully not Jennifer Garner or Samuel L. Jackson. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB… which always has our backs, right?), sued Capital One, N.A., and its parent holding company, Capital One Financial Corp., for “cheating millions of consumers... Read more

On December 18th, one of the most striking takeaways from Fed Chair Powell's press conference was the shift in the Fed's focus from the labor market to inflation data. Said shift was frequently reinforced in subsequent speeches by other Fed members. Traders were left to decide how much they would... Read more

Broad, Negative Momentum is Masking Normal Market Movers Tuesday featured a much weaker PPI report that failed to inspire any lasting rally in the bond market. While there were a few ways to reconcile that specific turn of events by examining the internal components of the data, it's also true... Read more

The Producer Price Index (PPI) may not be nearly as much of a market mover as the Consumer Price Index (CPI), but it has proven capable of producing logical reactions in the past when it's come in much higher or lower than expected. Today's installment was much lower than expected--something... Read more

“The older I get, the earlier it gets late.” It was early to bed last night for me, early to rise, since today we are heading to Austin, Texas for the Sales Rally at University Federal Credit Union. I am sure that a conversation topic will be the capital markets... Read more

Bonds Calmed Down After Early Weakness This week's relevant economic data is concentrated over the Tue-Thu time frame with Wednesday's CPI being the most obvious headliner. Today's session offered little by way of new information but nonetheless provided some insight as to how the market would approach this week's data.... Read more

“An economics professor was walking with a student when the student looked down and said, ‘Look! A $50 bill!’ The professor explained, ‘That can’t be true. If it were a $50 bill someone would have already picked it up.’” Sometimes reality doesn’t match theory, nor does it match hopes. Originators... Read more

After last Friday's jobs report, the evaporation of Fed rate cut probability has been a common refrain.  While it's true that there was an obvious shift in both long and short term rates, it was a drop in the bucket compared to the broader move that has transpired since early October.... Read more

Sizeable, Straightforward Selling Spree Today's jobs report was much stronger than expected and there were no compelling counterpoints to give traders any second thoughts.  As such, traders proceeded logically by dumping bonds.  Trading levels hit the 3pm close very close to the levels seen immediately after the jobs report and... Read more

In Los Angeles County, with 4,058 square miles of land (more than Delaware and Rhode Island combined) at least ten people have died, and more than 10,000 structures have burned and hundreds of thousands of residents are under evacuation orders in what will be the costliest wildfire disaster in American... Read more

The morning trading is as straightforward as it is unpleasant.  Nonfarm payrolls crushed expectations (256k vs 160k f'cast) and the unemployment rate also improved (4.1 vs 4.2). While the Fed may have downplayed the role of the labor market in guiding the rate outlook at the last meeting, the jobs... Read more