2011-06-07

Treasuries Notes Rise for Seventh Week, the longest streak in more than two years

Sorry if this turns into some sort of self congratulating post here, the objective here is to show readers that they should oppose their primal instinct which asks them to follow the heard, and actually become a contrarian and do the opposite.

This post is a look back at one of the forecasts that I made, just 7-8 weeks ago when Treasuries were bottoming and everybody absolutely hated them (and they still do!):

2011-04-12 — New Book: Super Boom - Why the Dow Jones Will Hit 38,820 And How You Can Profit From It
The only thing that are not bought aggressively are the USD and the US Treasuries, the two real and only bargains in this market.
And here's a quote from Bloomberg report from last week. Please note that the report does a lot of rationalization in order to find fundamental reasons why the treasuries are rising. Am I an oracle and knew these issues would happen at exactly that time? Of course not. Fundamentals do not drive markets. Sentiment does.

Anyway, here's the quote:
May 28 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury notes gained for a seventh week, the longest streak in more than two years, as concern the debt crisis in Europe is worsening and signs of slowing growth in the world’s largest economy stoked demand for the relative safety of government debt.

Two-, five- and seven-year notes gained as investors bid the most in almost 17 years for five-year debt and since seven- year securities were reintroduced in 2009 at auctions this week, while benchmark 10-year notes appreciated for a second week. U.S. government data showed the economy grew more slowly than forecast in the first three months of the year. Employers added fewer jobs in May than in April, according to a Bloomberg News survey before the June 3 report.

“As long as Europe is in this tenuous position, you’re going to have some safe-haven flow into U.S. fixed-income,” said Scott Sherman, an interest-rate strategist at Credit Suisse Group AG in New York, one of 20 primary dealers that trade directly with the Federal Reserve. “It will take some time to remove the uncertainty.”
[...]
Two-year yields fell four basis points to 0.48 percent, five-year note yields dropped seven basis points to 1.72 percent and seven-year notes declined eight basis points to 2.40 percent. The streak of declines in seven-year yields is the longest since the security was reintroduced in 2009. The runs of declines in two-and five-year yields were last seen in November and December of 2008.

Treasuries have returned 1.44 percent in May, heading for the best month since August, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch data. They rose 1.15 percent in April and have returned 2.47 percent so far this year.

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