U.S. Treasuries rise ahead of initial jobless claims, Q4 GDP

The U.S. Treasuries rose Thursday as investors await the country’s weekly initial jobless claims and fourth quarter gross domestic product (GDP) scheduled to be released today and on January 25 respectively.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasuries fell nearly 2 basis points to 2.63 percent, the super-long 30-year bond yields also slumped close to 2 basis points to 2.92 percent and the yield on the short-term 2-year traded a tad lower at 2.08 percent by 12:40GMT.

In the US, today brings two reports that will feed into Friday’s estimate of Q4 GDP – the preliminary goods trade and inventory data for December. As far as the trade report is concerned, our US chief economist Mike Moran expects both exports and imports to have cooled after sharp increases in November, with a larger shift in imports leading to a narrower deficit.

That, however, will still leave the overall trade deficit in Q4 notably wider than that in Q3, suggesting that net trade subtracted from economic growth in the final quarter. New home sales figures for December are also due. Expectations for some payback after a surge in November are likely to have been reinforced by the broad-based drop of 3.6 percent in existing home sales reported yesterday. In the bond markets, the US Treasury will sell 7-year Notes.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 Futures traded 0.28 percent higher at 2,848.50 by 12:45GMT, while at 12:00GMT, the FxWirePro's Hourly Dollar Strength Index remained slightly bearish at -89.38 (a reading above +75 indicates a bullish trend, while that below -75 a bearish trend). For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex

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