MBS Live Day Ahead: Today's NFP Trade May Not be Market's "Final Answer"

I wish Who Wants to be a Millionaire was still a popular show.  Its catchphrases and terminology work really well with bond market psychology.  Often times, bonds will look like they're going to move in one particular direction for one particular reason only to end up changing their "final answer" based on new info that came to light after using one of their lifelines.  

In the current case, the metaphorical contestant looks set to answer the question in a fairly clear way.  Anything but a horrible NFP number today should obviously result in a bigger-picture bounce for yields for a few reasons.  First of all there's the simple fact that the present bond rally is getting long in the tooth.  This coincides with potential bounces at technical levels around 2.12%, and the bottom of the recent trend channel (teal and yellow lines respectively in the chart below).  Finally, momentum technicals are either bottoming out (long term, the bottom section of the chart) or have already bounced (short-term, the middle section).

The confluence of multiple indicators means that a bounce is the obvious risk.  The potential blessing in disguise is that a bounce is almost TOO obvious.  The metaphorical contestant can see it.  This late in the game, the contestant might assume it's a bit of a trick question and thus phone a friend, ask the audience, or take a 50/50.

In the real world, these lifelines correspond to a delay of the "final answer."  The trading  reaction could take the form of initial weakness that gives the appearance of the "obvious" bounce, but that is subsequently erased later today or next week.  I will say that most traders are leaning in the direction of a bounce and have already baked in a pretty bad number this morning (i.e. the street is thinking NFP will be lower than forecast).  But as we discussed yesterday, when too many traders think one thing, markets often move in the opposite direction.  We'll know shortly as far as the initial reaction is concerned, but we may be waiting for next week before getting the "final answer" on a big break below 2.12 versus a big bounce back up toward 2.22%.