Good morning on this best day of the week, Wednesday from your Hometown Lender ,

Groundhog’s Day(s) in the bond market.

Mortgage bonds continuing to slip lower, which means rate are heading marginally higher. We aren’t seeing big moves, just gradual worsening since last Wednesday’s Fed meeting. Yesterday’s better than expected CPI data wasn’t enough to stem the slow bleed, since it really did nothing to change markets’ outlook that the Fed won’t need to cut and that a recession is not forthcoming. The outlook for rate sheets is that we will continue to hold near these levels or see slow worsening heading into next week. Without a clear path to improvement, locking some loans makes sense.

Today doesn’t have any big economic news or other headlines.

Tomorrow though, brings weekly jobless claims, wholesale inflation (PPI), manufacturing data, retail sales, and is capped off with Fed Chair Jerome Powell speaking. It will take some weak economic data to help bonds rebound from the recent losses, and it wouldn’t hurt if the jobless claims came in higher. What is more likely is that traders will shrug off any weakness in the data, and if bonds do improve it won’t be enough to do much but wipe away a small bit of the recent losses in pricing.

Stay safe and make today, great!