I am very excited, because last night I received news that I had won $5 million in the Netherlands lotto! Unfortunately I will receive $5 a year for a million years… Seriously, not a day goes by that I don’t receive some e-mail like, “Wherein your email address emerged as one of the online Winning emails in the 1st category and therefore attracted a cash award of EUR1,500,000.00 (One Million Five Hundred Thousand Euros) and a Compaq laptop.” AND a laptop!? Life doesn’t get any better.
How did mortgage rates and prices do yesterday? Not too bad, all things considered. Traders reported selling from money managers and originators and “lighter than usual” buying from the Fed at the start of the day, but then that reversed itself as the day progressed. There are no large Treasury auctions in the near future, unlike this week which finished things off with the $13 billion 30-yr bond auction yesterday.Today we’ve already seen a strong Retail Sales number, which has pushed rates higher. Retail Sales increased 1.3% last month, the largest advance since August, after rising by a downwardly revised 1.1% in October. It was the second straight monthly gain. Compared to November last year, sales were up 1.9 percent, the first year-on-year gain since August 2008. The numbers have pushed the 10-yr yield up to 3.53% and made mortgage prices worse by about .250.