The Jerome Powell confirmation hearing before the Senate Banking Committee has come and gone with the new chairman basically affirming the status quo. Revised GDP was adjusted higher to 3.3% this morning bringing in some selling at the long end of the curve. Since there has been a lot of hype in the financial press about a flatter yield curve today’s hiccup in that trend has been overdue. The curve steeping is putting some recent positions chasing the flattening news under pressure. European long bonds had already started diving led by the Guilt popping up 8 basis points on the Brexit deal reverberations. This price action makes upcoming inflation reports all the more important . Gold which has also been trapped pretty tightly recently also under some pretty heavy pressure this morning . The threat of quicker than expected interest rate upticks might push this market lower. It seems much of the possible interest in gold has been stolen by all the hype around crypto- currencies especially of course Bitcoin. The publicity around these vehicles is really amazing as has been the price action. I’m looking forward till when they’ll be listed on the CMEgroup. Stocks mixed this morning depending on what sector you look at. Some fairly impressive selling has hit the tech sector so the Nasdaq is under pressure but the financials continue the breakout higher and so the Dow and S&P are pushing into new record levels. Sector rotation like this does present spreading opportunities. Please call to discuss any of these markets .
