Another quiet week in the markets, typical for late summer. What could have moved the markets and didn’t were the Consumer Price Index , which was unchanged, and housing starts were up 0.5%, building permits unchanged. So flat, flat, flat. The next day the data for Industrial Production showed that it was up 0.7% and Capacity Utilization was up 0.5 – both bad news for the mortgage rates pushing rates up on Thursday. All eyes are on the world banking leaders meeting next week on the 25th in Jackson Hole Wyoming. Ears will be listening to keynote Speaker Janet Yellen. It should be noted that at NO time since 1990 did the Fed raise the prime rate for the 2 months before an election. So it is unlikely that they will this year either. Breathing a sigh of relief, the markets can somewhat count on being boring and predictable for now…
So with the little up and the little down, typical end of summer flat line in rates. Rates remain the same as last week.
The big data for next week will be Tuesday’s July New Home Sales report, followed on Wednesday by the July Existing Home sales figures. The July Durable Goods Order numbers will be posted on Thursday and the government will issue its second “guesstimate” of Q2 Gross Domestic Product on Friday.
The Treasury Department will conduct a three-part, three-day debt sale next week as well. First up on the auction block will be $26 billion in 2-year notes on Tuesday, followed by $34-billion in 5-year notes on Wednesday, and the whole thing will wrap-up on Thursday with the sale of $28 billion in 7-year notes. Depending on demand this could move rates…