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NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Treasury prices tumbled on Thursday as the benchmark 10-year note yield pushed to the brink of 3%, a psychological threshold emblematic of its sharp climb since early May.

The Federal Reserve will lose control of interest rates as the "great rotation" out of bonds into equities takes off in full force, according to one market watcher, who sees U.S. 10-year Treasury yields hitting 5-6 percent in the next 18-24 months. "It is our opinion that interest rates have begun their assent, that the Fed will eventually lose control of interest rates. The yield curve will first steepen and then will shift, moving rates significantly higher," said Mike Crofton, President and CEO, Philadelphia Trust Company told CNBC on Wednesday. "If the great rotation that everybody talks about out of...

The first officially recorded municipal bond was issued by the City of New York for a canal in 1812. It was a general obligation bond, meaning the city pledged every available resource – most notably, tax revenue – to repay the debt. So, in theory, unless the city lost its legal ability to levy taxes, which it never would, investors would be repaid... If Orr succeeds, look for all hell to break loose. Just like we witnessed during the real estate collapse when homeowners started walking away from their mortgage obligations without any recourse, other cash-strapped municipalities are destined to...

The Securities and Exchange Commission accused Miami and its former budget director of securities fraud related to several municipal bond offerings. The city and Michael Boudreaux made materially false and misleading statements and omissions about interfund transfers in three 2009 bond offerings totaling $153.5 million, the SEC said in a statement Friday. Boudreaux orchestrated the transfers to mask growing deficits in the city’s general fund, the SEC said. The SEC in 2010 started cracking down on state and local governments for not providing investors in the municipal bond market with accurate information about pension liabilities. Since then, Illinois and New...

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke will have a Q&A following the release on the Fed’s FOMC minutes today at 2pm EST. Here are the minutes. Quick summary of the last FOMC meeting: half the voting members want to stop asset purchases later this year. The other half, wait for improving economic conditions. The reaction in the 10 year Treasury yield? t10reaction But prior to his Q&A session, the 10 year Treasury auction went off as expected. trreas10yraux The 10 Year High Yield continues to climb. ust10ihg The 30 year auction is tomorrow. Stay tuned!

The Trigger Has Been Pulled And The Slaughter Of The Bonds Has Begun By Michael Snyder June 25th, 2013 The Bears Are Unleashed On Wall StreetWhat does it look like when a 30 year bull market ends abruptly? What happens when bond yields start doing things that they haven't done in 50 years? If your answer to those questions involves the word "slaughter", you are probably on the right track. Right now, bonds are being absolutely slaughtered, and this is only just the beginning. Over the last several years, reckless bond buying by the Federal Reserve has forced yields down...

Has the Great Financial Crisis Finally Arrived? Stock-Markets / Credit Crisis 2013 June 23, 2013 - 05:33 AM GMT By: Graham Summers The technical damage from yesterday’s bloodbath was severe. Spain, which lead the “Europe is saved” party from the lows last year has just taken out its trendline. So much for the “crisis is over” proclamations. We’re heading back down in a big way. The S&P 500 has also taken out its trendline. QE Forever is dead and buried. What will hold the market up now? Copper is indicating that the entire post-2009 “recovery” is ending. We’re moving back...

U.S. Treasury Bond Market Implosion Has Officially Begun Interest-Rates / US Bonds June 21, 2013 - 06:02 PM GMT By: Graham Summers The QE Infinite parade officially ended yesterday when Bernanke hinted at tapering QE later this year or in mid-2014. I first warned about this in mid-May writing, "If Bernanke is going to step down (as hinted by his decision to skip out on the Jackson Hole meeting) he’s not going to want to leave with the Fed going at QE 3 and QE 4 full throttle. Instead his best bet would be to take his foot off the...

St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard worried that the Fed's decision earlier this week to announce a plan to reduce bond buying was poorly timed, the regional Fed bank said in a statement on Friday explaining his dissent. "President Bullard ... felt that the committee's decision to authorize the chairman to lay out a more elaborate plan for reducing the pace of asset purchases was inappropriately timed," the St. Louis Fed's statement said. Bullard was one of two dissents cast on Wednesday by members of the U.S. central bank's policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee. The other dissent, by...

Gold, Silver, Stocks, Bonds Plunge On Fed Noise And China Debt Crisis Risk Commodities / Gold and Silver 2013 Jun 20, 2013 - 04:14 PM GMT By: GoldCore Today’s AM fix was USD 1,303.25, EUR 986.34 and GBP 842.38 per ounce. Yesterday’s AM fix was USD 1,366.00, EUR 1,019.86 and GBP 874.91 per ounce. Gold fell $16.10 or 1.18% yesterday and closed at $1,351.00/oz. Silver sank to $21.25 and ended down 1.25%. Bonds, shares plus gold and silver fell sharply around the world this morning after the U.S. Federal Reserve again suggested an end to their easy money policies. Data...

Global Recession Forecast - Is PIMCO's Bill Gross Wrong Again? Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2013 June 17, 2013 - 05:01 PM GMT By: Money Morning Keith Fitz-Gerald writes: Stuart Varney put the question directly to me last week during his Fox Business show: What do I make of comments from PIMCO's Bill Gross...that he's projecting a 60% chance of a global recession in the next three to five years? Now, Bill Gross is obviously one of the most powerful men in the world. PIMCO, the firm he founded, is the world's biggest bond manager. He has assets under management of...

JIM O'NEILL: We Could See A Bond Crash Steven Perlberg Jun. 14, 2013, 12:33 PM As the market speculates on when the Fed will begin to slow its quantitative easing program, former Goldman Sachs Asset Management chairman Jim O'Neill isn't alone in believing a taper would mean turbulence for financial markets. But for O'Neill, it would also "not be a stretch" to see 5% yields on the 10-year Treasury, reports Bloomberg. Given the 10-year's current 2.11% yield, that would imply a big sell-off in the bond market. O'Neill talked about that — and his prediction for a bond crash —...

BOFA: 'RISKS OF A BOND CRASH ARE HIGH' Sam Ro May 31, 2013, 11:02 AM Bonds have been tumbling for most of the month, and most analysts have warned that it could get even uglier. In a note to clients yesterday titled "Bubble, Bubble, Toil & Trouble," Bank of America Merrill Lynch strategist Michael Hartnett warns that the "risks of a bond crash are high." More from his note (emphasis added): As we have argued in recent years, history shows that major breakouts in equity markets tend to coincide with major inflection points in bond yields (Chart). This is now...

The Treasury Bond Selloff Is 'For Real' And The Volume Is Gigantic Matthew Boesler May 29, 2013, 2:05 PMIt's been a crazy few weeks in the Treasury bond market. After a big rally that began in mid-March, amid the outbreak of the Cypriot financial crisis and fears over a slowdown in global growth, Treasuries have given up all of their gains, and bond yields are now rising to the highest levels in over a year. This morning, the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury hit a high of 2.23%. Naturally, there is a lot of debate over where yields go...

NIKKEI 15,000! First Time Since January 2008 Sam Ro May 14, 2013, 8:07 PM Markets just opened in Asia, and they're following the U.S. markets way higher. Of note is Japan's Nikkei 225, which just burst through 15,000. Dow Jones reports this is the first time the Nikkei has been above 15,000 since January 4, 2008. Leading the way is electronics maker Sony, which is up by around 12%. Hedge fund heavy hitter Dan Loeb made a proposal to management to split up the company. Loeb said he was willing to commit a significant amount of capital to support the...

GUNDLACH: Anyone Who Says Interest Rates Will Rise Soon Is 'Absolutely Wrong' Lance Roberts, Street Talk LiveMay 3, 2013, 10:52 AMJeffry Gundlach In the continuing series of reports from the 10thannual Strategic Investment Conference, presented Altegris Investments and John Mauldin, the question of why you should own bonds was answered by Jeff Gundlach who is the CEO and CIO of Double Line. Why own bonds? I have been presented with the question twice in my career. The first time was in the 90’s when bonds and stocks were highly correlated. If stocks rose, bond prices fell, and vice versa. Therefore,...

<p>Good News! Non-farm payrolls increase by 165,000 and the unemployment rate declined to 7.5%.</p> <p>But I thought the Sequester would destroy employment? Apparently not. The Administration’s Sequester Scare tactics failed.</p>

Uncertainty increased in global markets as investor fear grows. Recent Central Bank aggressive moves (Fed, Bank of Japan and South Korea) send a signal of global economic weakness. It didn’t help that former ECB executive board member Lorenzo Bini-Smaghi said that “policy makers led by President Mario Draghi will act to weaken the euro.” Is this the ECB’s return fire in the new currency war? US stock market indices are down today, particularly the NASDAQ index. And Europe is down over 2%. Real estate investment trusts (REITS) also tanked today. The volatility index VIX climbed today. Sovereign yields are up...

It’s not often — but not unpredecented — for Federal Reserve officials to make joint appearances. But Tuesday night’s gathering when Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker hosted Chicago Fed President Charles Evans was notable for the debate format that ensued from the opposite ends of the monetary policy spectrum.Lacker is a reliable hawk, who wants the central bank’s bond buying efforts to stop, and dissented on every policy decision last year (he doesn’t have a vote this year). Evans by contrast is a dove among doves, and an influential member who came up with the idea — now adopted by...

It is not surprising that they quickly found the source of their pain, the bond holders; those money loving, rich old white guys who know nothing but greed. It is their fault that huge lifelong pensions and free healthcare for life, regardless of how long you worked for the city has not turned Stockton into the utopia it should have been. It is amazing how greedy some people are, they simply don’t care about their fellow man. In a case that will most likely go to the US Supreme Court, the municipal bondholders will be pitted against the California Public...