U.S. Treasuries suffer ahead of FOMC’s July meeting minutes, Fed Chair Powell’s Jackson Hole speech

The U.S. Treasuries suffered during Wednesday’s afternoon session ahead of the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) end-July monetary policy meeting minutes, scheduled to be released today by 18:00GMT. Also, Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s speech at the Jackson Hole Symposium this week will add further direction to the debt market.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury yield jumped 2-1/2 basis points to 1.584 percent, the super-long 30-year bond yields surged 2 basis points to 2.063 percent and the yield on the short-term 2-year traded 2-1/2 basis points higher at 1.539 percent by 11:30GMT.

Today focus will remain on the FOMC minutes from the end-July meeting, when the Fed cut its FFR target rate by 25bps to 2.00-2.25 percent but offered a less dovish policy statement than had been expected.

But the Fed’s Jackson Hole Symposium – focussing on ‘The challenges for monetary policy’ – kicking off Thursday evening, with Chair Powell giving a keynote speech on Friday, will also be watched closely for any further up-to-date insights into policy-makers’ thinking  of the growing concerns about the global economic outlook, heightened geopolitical risks and recent moves in global financial markets, Daiwa Capital Markets reported.

Data-wise, today will also bring existing home sales figures for July, while new home sales data will be published on Friday. Also, Thursday will see the weekly jobless claims numbers released alongside the flash Markit PMIs and Kansas Fed activity index for August and the Conference Board’s leading indices for July. In the markets, the US Treasury will sell 30Y TIPS on Thursday, the report added.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 Futures traded 0.68 percent higher at 2,918.12 by 11:35GMT.