Chris Probert's Page

This week is extremely busy in terms of economic data scheduled for release and will likely be another active week for mortgage rates. The number of releases is actually irrelevant due to the importance of the some of the reports. There are eight economic releases scheduled for the week in addition to the first Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting of the year. All but two of the releases scheduled are considered to be of moderate or high importance, meaning we should see quite a bit of… Continue

Bad news continues to infiltrate the markets today and Mortgage Bonds, currently near unchanged levels, are already far below where they were earlier. Stocks around the globe are lower fueled by worldwide recession fears. Japan became the latest economy to fall into a recession.



Banking giant Citigroup announced it will lay off 50,000 people on top of the 23,000 jobs they cut earlier this year. These heavy cuts would leave the second-largest US bank with about 300,000 jobs… Continue

Mortgage Bonds are trading a bit higher, but already far off the best levels of the day.



In a speech this morning, Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker, said the US economy was definitely in a recession, but he believed it would be fairly moderate in size. "We are in a contraction. Up until the summer it was a fairly mild recession,". Mr. Lacker, is not a voting Fed member, but he will be back in the voting rotation in 2009.



The ISM Index for October was reported at 38.9,… Continue

"It's Deja Vu All Over Again", said Yogi Berra...and that is what is happening again today with wild swings and high volatility for both Stocks and Bonds.



Global markets fell overnight on increasing concern that central banks around the world will not have enough ammo in their arsenals to ward off a deep recession. Stocks have now traded lower 15 out of the last 19 trading days in October. Mortgage Bonds are trading lower as large investors and hedge funds continue to unload… Continue

It's Deja Vu All Over Again...and that is what is happening again today with wild swings and high volatility for both Stocks and Bonds.



Global markets fell overnight on increasing concern that central banks around the world will not have enough ammo in their arsenals to ward off a deep recession. Stocks have now traded lower 15 out of the last 19 trading days in October. Mortgage Bonds are trading lower as large investors and hedge funds continue to unload positions ranging from… Continue