Rates on bonds have been up slightly all morning, and moved higher after the release of the Consumer Confidence report. At one point the 10-year Treasury was +.031% to 4.618%.

The Conference Board reported that Consumer Confidence was lower than last month, and at the low end of the range of expectations. Economists were looking for Consumer Confidence to come in at 107.0 to 109.0. The actual number was 107.2, and February’s 112.5 was revised down to 111.2.

Normally, this would cause rates to be flat or lower. Not so today. The obvious question, why? We wish we could give you an answer, but we don’t see it in the wires or any other explanation. The details do not justify higher rates. The forward looking portion of the Consumer Confidence was lower than last month.

The only possible explanation we have is traders and investors were guessing that the Consumer Confidence would be even lower than thought. We had the same feeling. If true, the number was lower than the experts, but higher than the investors thought.

At 09:45cdt {14:45gmt} the 10-year Treasury is +.016% with the rate at 4.605%.

TOMORROW, 28 March 2997.

The bond market opens with the Durable Goods Orders. This only has an occasional likelihood of moving rates. The market expects Durable Goods to be +3.0% to +3.7% verses last month’s report of -7.8%. While we think Durable Goods Orders may be higher, we question if there has been that much improvement in the economy to cause people to by washing machines and cars, and for industry to buy 747s. It could be good for rates.

[Publisher’s note: In an attempt to clean up our blog, we will post all three outlooks on Monday only. We will post an outlook on days when one is modified.]

Steve Boxmeyer [612] 799 – 6858
steve@LendWithIntegrity.com