Archive for June, 2009

Swaps and MBS

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

It has been a wild and volatile day in mortgages. At the moment FNMA 5s are about 5 ticks better to swaps. There has been a huge down in coupon trade and that has caused significant movement.  As we speak the FNMA 4s are 15/21 tighter to swaps whilst the FNMA ...

Agency Market

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Agency spreads are tighter across the yield curve. Two year sector paper is narrower by one basis point. Five year paper is better by 3 basis points and the ten year sector narrowed by 2 basis points. The Open Market Desk announced that it would intervene in the market tomorrow and ...

Musical Interlude, Briefly

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

For this baby boomer Frank Sinatra was a real revelation late in life. Now playing "Only the Lonely".

Corporate Bonds

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Corporate bonds are on fire as they have been for some time. Spreads are better by 5 basis points to 10 basis points. One veteran salesman and friend of the blog notes that there are no sellers and only buyers. He offers that volume is lighter than one would expect because ...

Bond Result

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

It was a very strong auction which stopped at 4.72 percent. The foreign central banks bought near ly 50 percent of the issue. http://www.treasurydirect.gov/instit/annceresult/press/preanre/2009/R_20090611_1.pdf

Bond Auction

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

There has been some chunky buying and some chunky as well as lots of volatility. The Bond is back to 4.74 after trading 4.83 this morning. The conventional wisdom is that the market has found equilibrium around 4 percent 10 year and 4.80 ish bonds. Mortgages were the canary in the coal ...

MBS

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Mortgages are lagging swaps by about a tick this morning. The level of activity is quite subdued. One noteworthy data point. Low coupon mortgages are outperforming. Two portfolio managers with whom I spoke felt that the selling in those issues has exhausted itself. This is noteworthy ,I think, because these low ...

Capitulation?

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Apparently the earlier sell off was partly the resultof some huge trades in the futures pits. I have heard that 20000  5 year contracts traded as well as 6000 bond contracts. One trader in an email described the trades as capitulation.

Libor

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

I am a little late withthis but better late than never I guess. Libor set at 0.62938 versus 0.63875 yesterday. I believe that is the first time it has been below 0.63.

IG 12 and Some CDS

Thursday, June 11th, 2009

- 5yr Snr Bank CDS: BAC 165/175 (unch), CITI 365/375 (unch), JPM 83/93 (-2), WFC 110/120 (-5) - 5yr Snr Broker CDS: GS 122/132 (unch), MS 200/210 (-3) - CDS Index: IG12 125.5/126.5 (+1)