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| BondsOnline.com: instant access to and extensive coverage of over 3.5 million stocks, bonds, indexes and other securities covering major and emerging markets and exchanges across the globe. |
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| Bonds Online |
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| 5/10/2013Market Performance |
| Municipal Bonds |
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S&P National Bond Index
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3.00% |
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S&P California Bond Index
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2.96% |
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S&P New York Bond Index
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3.13% |
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S&P National 0-5 Year Municipal Bond Index
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0.70% |
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| S&P/BGCantor US Treasury Bond |
400.09 |
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| Income Equities: |
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| Preferred Stocks |
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S&P U.S. Preferred Stock Index
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848.03 |
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S&P U.S. Preferred Stock Index (CAD)
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636.26 |
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S&P U.S. Preferred Stock Index (TR)
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1,701.05 |
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S&P U.S. Preferred Stock Index (TR) (CAD)
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1,276.26 |
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| REITs |
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S&P REIT Index
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174.07 |
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S&P REIT Index (TR)
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425.30 |
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| MLPs |
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S&P MLP Index
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2,469.58 |
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S&P MLP Index (TR)
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5,428.50 |
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See Data
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Europe's Pain, Treasury's Gain
A soaring budget deficit was supposed to have U.S. bonds out of favor by now, but in a jittery market safety always finds a home. |
Forbes.com - May 20, 2010 - by Matthew Craft
The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury bond dropped to its lowest point in 2010 Thursday, as concern that Europe will struggle to solve its debt problems sent traders from around the world scrambling into the comparatively safe Treasury market. The 10-year yield hit 3.19% Thursday afternoon before moving up to 3.22%. The yield touched 4% as recently as April 5.
U.S. Treasury bonds were supposed to be out of favor by now, a result of spiraling budget deficits and fed-up Chinese buyers. But the doomsayers didn't take the rest of the world's problems into account. Just as in the darkest days of the financial crisis in 2008, when the world's investors get scared they rush to buy Treasuries, pushing bond prices up and yields down.
"Certainly, the U.S. fiscal picture is not ideal," says Thomas Simons, fixed-income economist at Jefferies. The U.S. Treasury has $8.46 trillion in tradable debt outstanding, a figure moving higher every week. "But where else are you going to go?" he asks.
China, for instance, not only remains the largest foreign owner of Treasuries but has also added long-term U.S. bonds to its stash this year.
Bond traders often point to the side benefit of the U.S. having more tradable debt than anybody else: the Treasury market is the most liquid in the world. Treasuries are easy to buy and easy to sell, so as investors sell euros and euro-denominated assets, many park their cash in Treasury debt and earn a small yield.
At the moment, Simons says, uncertainty over how Europe's problems will play out is keeping markets volatile. When questions like "Will Germany go its own way?" or "Will Greece or another country pull out of the European Union?" make the rounds, the euro and euro-denominated debt are bound to sell off. Fear makes people miss good news: Spain, often nominated as the next Greece, sold 3.5 billion euros in 10-year bonds at a 4.05% rate on Thursday, according to the Royal Bank of Scotland. Buyers placed bids for double that amount.
"There's this fear that everybody in Europe is in trouble and everybody could default," Simons says. "But Spain is not the Gordian knot that Greece is."
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| BondsOnline Advisor |
Income Security Recommendation January 2013 Issue.
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