Agenda
| Time | Indicator/Event | Comment |
| 08:30 | International trade | Slight narrowing in the deficit |
| 08:30 | Jobless claims | FAA-related claims may materialize this week |
| 09:45 | Bloomberg consumer comfort index | Still receding |
| 11:00 | 3- and 6-month bill announcement | Another increase expected |
| 11:00 | 5-yr TIPS (r) announcement | In a close call, unchanged at $10 billion |
| 13:00 | 30-yr bond auction | Another $16 billion offering |
Intraday Updates
[8:30 Data] Initial jobless claims continue to be a pleasant surprise, and point to a modest improvement in the payroll data for August. The international trade deficit, in contrast, was worse than expected, and pushes our interim projection for the revised Q2 GDP growth rate down to 0.8%. more »
Economic Indicators
Jobless claims and international trade are due at 8:30 this morning. The claims figure is even more of a wild card than usual due to the lingering uncertainty about the effects of the temporary FAA shutdown. The trade gap may narrow slightly in June after widening abruptly in May. more »
Federal Reserve Operations & the Overnight Market
Fed Open Market Operations There were no surprises in yesterday’s monthly outright purchase schedule announcement. more »
Fed Funds Monitor Fed funds data tables more »
Treasury Finance
The Treasury will complete its August refunding with the sale of $16 billion of 30-year bonds this afternoon at 1:00. It will also announce the terms of next Monday's 3- and 6-month bills and Thursday's 5-year TIPS reopening at 11:00 this morning. We expect the bill auction sizes to rise sharply again, while (in a close call) the TIPS offering might be held steady. more »
The Money Market Observer
Monday, Aug 8 Given that S&P obviously intended to downgrade the U.S. from the outset, it is probably best to have gotten the announcement out of the way quickly. Having the threat of that hanging over the market in the weeks and months ahead might have led to repeated bouts of volatility like that seen on Friday.
We don’t expect the Fed to make any major policy moves at this week’s FOMC meeting, but it will assuredly review its options for further easing. Only one of the three tools cited by Chairman Bernanke in his semi-annual testimony offers much hope of helping the economy. Strengthened rate guidance would not accomplish much at this juncture, and a reduction in the interest rate on reserves might actually be counter-productive. That leaves adjustments to the size or average maturity of the Fed’s portfolio as the only viable option among Bernanke's three choices. more »
Daily Press Summary (pdf)
ICAP's Inside Debt Report for Thursday, Aug 11 ICAP's Inside Debt provides relevant end-of-day news summaries and market sector commentary from Reuters for the FOREX, Treasuries, Corporates and Equities markets, a 3 pm EST market snapshot pricing of all market sectors from ICAP and economic data from Wrightson ICAP in a take-home, easy-to-read format. Download a PDF file of the most recent report now. go »
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