After moving to the downside early in the session, treasuries regained ground over the course of the trading day on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Bond prices climbed well off their early lows, ending the day little changed. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, inched up by 1.2 basis points to 3.206 percent after reaching a high of 3.253 percent.<\/p>\n
The recovery by treasuries came as stocks on Wall Street showed a substantial downturn after failing to sustain an early move to the upside. <\/p>\n
Stocks initially benefited from news China has cut quarantine times for international travelers in a big step toward easing Covid-19 controls but buying interest waned shortly after the start of trading amid lingering concerns about a potential recession.<\/p>\n
In U.S. economic news, the Conference Board released a report showing U.S. consumer confidence deteriorated to its lowest level in over a year in June.<\/p>\n
The Conference Board said its consumer confidence index slid to 98.7 in June from a downwardly revised 103.2 in May. Economists had expected the index to drop to 101.0 from the 106.4 originally reported for the previous month.<\/p>\n
With the continued decrease, the consumer confidence index fell to its lowest level since hitting 95.2 in February of 2021.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Treasury Department revealed this month’s auction of $40 billion worth of seven-year notes attracted above average demand.<\/p>\n
The seven-year note auction drew a high yield of 3.280 percent and a bid-to-cover ratio of 2.48, while the ten previous seven-year note auctions had an average bid-to-cover ratio of 2.37.<\/p>\n
The bid-to-cover ratio is a measure of demand that indicates the amount of bids for each dollar worth of securities being sold.<\/p>\n
On Monday, the Treasury revealed this month’s auctions of $46 billion worth of two-year notes and $47 billion worth of five-year notes attracted below average demand.<\/p>\n
Remarks by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell are likely to attract attention on Wednesday along with the Commerce Department’s final reading on first quarter GDP. <\/p>\n