BONDS: German Paper Outperforms Gilts Across The Curve; JGBs Set Tone For FI
Moves in long-end JGBs have provided the main impetus for global FI this morning, helping the German and UK curves flatten. German paper outperforms Gilts across the curve though, leaning bull flatter with yields -0.5 to -4bps lower. The Gilt curve has twist flattened, with 2-year yields up 3bps and 30-year yields down 4bps.
- French flash May inflation was much softer-than-expected at 0.6% Y/Y (vs 0.9% cons and prior), which is supporting outperformance at the EUR short-end relative to GBP.
- 30-year Gilt yields were 8bps lower at one point this morning, temporarily finding support from an FT interview with the DMO head. Pulay noted that “there has been an important shift in the relative proportions [of short/long-end Gilts to be issued] this year”, owing to the “declining strength” of demand for longer-dated paper.
- Bund futures are +23 ticks at 130.96, off session highs of 131.22. Gilts opened at a high of 91.89, but have since eased back to 91.36 (+36 ticks today). Rolls are dominating volume in Gilts today, with U5 expected to become the front contract from tomorrow.
- 10-year EGB spreads to Bunds are mixed, with peripherals leaning slightly wider but semi-core bonds little changed to a touch tighter.
- BTP Short Term / BTPei results were digested smoothly, while the Netherlands sold 5-year DSLs this morning. The new 7-year BTP Italia is on offer for retail investors between today and Thursday.
- Eurozone economic confidence was slightly better-than-expected at 94.8 (vs 94.1 cons, 93.8 prior).
- Overnight, the UK May BRC shop price index was in line with consensus at -0.1% Y/Y (vs -0.1% prior). The CBI distributive trades survey is due at 1100BST.
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US TSYS: Extraordinary Measures And Cash Look Sufficient To Head Off X-Date
Treasury has about $164B in "extraordinary measures" available as of April 23 to avoid hitting the debt limit, per its regular report out Friday. That's out of a maximum total of $375B (they have used $211B).
- With Treasury cash looking healthy (around $600B), that's a fair amount of dry powder to get through the summer months to wait out the debt limit impasse. Tax receipts have looked strong with tariff revenues also starting to boost cash flows, further reducing the near-term urgency to adjust bond issuance.
- This has also helped push back analyst “x-date” expectations to later in the summer/September. We expect to hear from Treasury about its own x-date assumptions next week.
US TSYS: Treasury Market Trading Stayed Orderly In April: Fed Report
Liquidity across financial markets including the Treasury market deteriorated after President Trump's April 2 reciprocal tariffs announcement but market functioning was generally orderly, according to the Federal Reserve's semiannual report on financial stability, released Friday. (PDF link is here)
- Treasury market liquidity has been poor for years and yields were particularly volatile in early April, contributing to a deterioration in market liquidity, the Fed said.
- Nevertheless "trading remained orderly, and markets continued to function without serious disruption," according to the report, which looked at information available as of April 11.
FED: Ex-Gov Warsh: Fed Has Failed To Satisfy Price Stability Remit
From our Washington Policy Team - Some fairly sharp words today from ex-Fed Governor Warsh on the central bank (who for what it's worth is seen by betting markets as by far the frontrunner for the next Fed Chair):
- The best way for the Federal Reserve to safeguard its independence is for policymakers to avoid expanding the institution's role over time, including wading into policy areas that are outside its core mission, former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, a leading contender to replace Jerome Powell as chair next year, said Friday.
- "I strongly believe in the operational independence of monetary policy as a wise political economy decision. And I believe that Fed independence is chiefly up to the Fed," Warsh said in a speech at a Group of Thirty event on the sidelines of the IMF meetings. "Institutional drift has coincided with the Fed’s failure to satisfy an essential part of its statutory remit, price stability. It has also contributed to an explosion of federal spending." His speech made no mention of Trump's tariffs or the appropriate monetary policy to deal with them.
- He said the ideas of data dependence and forward guidance widely adopted by Fed officials are not especially useful and might even be counterproductive.
"We should care little about two numbers to the right of the decimal point in the latest government release. Breathlessly awaiting trailing data from stale national accounts -- subject to significant, subsequent revision -- is evidence of false precision and analytic complacency," he said.
"Near-term forecasting is another distracting Fed preoccupation. Economists are not immune to the frailties of human nature. Once policymakers reveal their economic forecast, they can become prisoners of their own words. Fed leaders would be well-served to skip opportunities to share their latest musings."
