MBS RECAP: MBS Outperform to End Near Unchanged Levels

By: Matthew Graham

While yesterday was a surprise due to changes in Fed forecasts, today was anything but--at least if you bought in to the notion that yesterday's sell-off was a mathematical event based on markets adjusting present day trading levels to long-term forecasts.  Also helping the sell-off wrap up quickly was the fact that Yellen's singular definition of "considerable" (even if she added caveats, the only time frame she offered was "6 months," which is an unquestionable departure from Bernanke) left little uncertainty as to how to run the math for that mathematical sell-off. 

Morning data could be argued to be a wash with weaker home sales, lower than previous Jobless Claims that were still higher than expected, and a seemingly positive Philly Fed survey that had some downbeat internal components.  It's one thing to have one report offset another, but all three of today's reports 'offset themselves,' so to speak.

The net effect was a +0-01 change in production MBS and a half a bp increase in 10yr yields that remained well under 2-day highs.  Pretty uneventful.


MBS Pricing Snapshot
Pricing shown below is delayed, please note the timestamp at the bottom. Real time pricing is available via MBS Live.
MBS
FNMA 3.0
96-05 : +0-06
FNMA 3.5
100-08 : +0-03
FNMA 4.0
103-22 : +0-01
Treasuries
2 YR
0.4238 : +-0.0002
10 YR
2.7771 : +0.0051
30 YR
3.6681 : -0.0019
Pricing as of 3/20/14 5:37PMEST

Today's Reprice Alerts and Updates
A recap of Alerts and Updates provided to MBS Live subscribers.
3:36PM  :  Drifting Through Afternoon Near Best Levels; Uneventful!
1:35PM  :  ALERT ISSUED: Slowly, Steadily Approaching Negative Reprice Risk
10:21AM  :  Bond Markets Slightly Weaker After 10am Data
8:50AM  :  Bond Markets Fighting to Hold Ground After Claims Data

MBS Live Chat Highlights
A recap of featured comments from the Live Discussion on the MBS Live Dashboard.
Clayton Sandy  :  "question; I have a guy that had a short sale a just over two years. He had a first and second and the second was actually the one that got shorted. Would normal short sale rules apply?"
Matt Schofield  :  "Clayton - There is only one way to get around that. FHA will reduce the time that the short sale needs to be seasoned if the short sale was due to economic hardship such as losing a job, household income was cut by 50% due to a death of the other wage earner or loss of employment of the other wage earner. But they cant have any credit issues after the short sale with the re established credit history."
Joshua Crater  :  "Hey MG, nice shout out on CNBC today!"