Treasuries Give Back Ground Following Recent Strength
(RTTNews) - After moving sharply higher over the past few sessions, treasuries gave back ground during the trading day on Tuesday.
Bond prices moved to the downside early in the day and remained firmly negative throughout the session. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, climbed 6.8 basis points to 3.307 percent.
The ten-year yield rebounded after tumbling by 24.4 basis points over the course of the three previous sessions, pulling back off the eleven-year closing high set last Tuesday.
The pullback by treasuries came as a significant rally on Wall Street reduced the appeal of safe havens such as bonds.
Meanwhile, traders largely shrugged off a report from the National Association of Realtors showing another steep drop in U.S. existing home sales in the month of May.
NAR said existing home sales plunged by 3.4 percent to an annual rate of 5.41 million in May after slumping by 2.6 percent to a revised rate of 5.60 million in April.
Economists had expected existing home sales to tumble by 3.7 percent to a rate of 5.40 million from the 5.61 million originally reported for the previous month.
Congressional testimony by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is likely to be in focus on Wednesday along with remarks by several other Fed officials.
Bond traders are also likely to keep an eye on the results of the Treasury Department's auction of $14 billion worth of twenty-year bonds.
