MBS RECAP: Another Quiet Session With a Narrow Range and Decent Gains

For MBS, today was substantially similar to Friday, with a narrow but positive trading range and little fanfare surrounding any headline event.  That's consistent with the expectation for the first two days of the week, which we've discussed in today's previous commentaries.  Long story short: month/quarter end create an environment where compulsory tradeflows are just as much of a market mover as anything.  This wouldn't necessarily be the case if heavier-hitting data was coming out today and tomorrow, but as it stands, there's nothing on the calendar that couldn't be overcome by determined tradeflow momentum.

As far as that momentum is concerned, the bigger picture looked mostly sideways today.  Specifically, Treasuries were definitely sideways and determined to stay that way despite some bigger swings in European markets and domestic stock averages.  MBS, however, enjoy a flat Treasury market as well as 2 rounds of scheduled Fed buying.  As such MBS had several reasons to outperform the broader bond market today, even if only slightly.

When it comes to data that can be easily overwhelmed by month/quarter-end tradeflows, tomorrow's offerings are less of a sure thing.  Chicago PMI hits at 9:45am and Consumer Confidence at 10am.  Both could shake things up, but shortly thereafter, we should have an increasingly clear picture of any potential imbalance between month-end buyers and sellers.