Mortgage rates are effectively unchanged from Friday afternoon. There is not much in the way of economic data out this week so I’ll be tracking two other factors.
First, the US Treasury is back at auctioning off US Treasuries this week as the Federal Government continues to raise massive amounts of cash to finance the deficit. The most notable auctions will take place on Wednesday and Thursday when the Treasury auctions $21 billion in 10-year notes & $13 billion in 30-year bonds. Should demand be strong it should help mortgage rates and vice versa.
Second, earnings season begins today. For the next few weeks corporations will release 4th quarter earnings reports and future outlook. Because there is such a wild variance in opinions regarding the outlook for the US economy I expect these reports to cause some volatility (click this link to understand how the stock market impacts mortgage rates).
For now we don’t see an urgent need to lock. I will shift my outlook to neutral.
Current outlook: neutral