BLBG: Treasuries Little Changed as Fed to Keep Rates at Record Low
By Anchalee Worrachate and Wes Goodman
Dec. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Treasuries were little changed, snapping a five-day decline, as economists said the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates at a record low when it finishes a meeting today.
The policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee will repeat its pledge to hold borrowing costs near zero for an “extended period” to foster the economic recovery, Ed McKelvey, senior U.S. economist at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in New York, wrote in a report yesterday. Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said this week the U.S. unemployment rate and the level of unused manufacturing capacity will help keep inflation low.
“The recovery will be very weak,” said Satoshi Okumoto, a general manager at Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance Co. in Tokyo, which oversees the equivalent of $61.4 billion. “The market will be stable,” snapping the weeklong decline.
The 10-year note yield fell 1 basis point to 3.58 percent as of 8:30 a.m. in London, according to BGCantor Market Data. The 3.375 percent security due in November 2019 rose 3/32, or 94 cents per $1,000 face amount, to 98 11/32.
The Fed will hold its target for overnight lending between banks in a range of zero to 0.25 percent, all 98 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News predict.
“The FOMC meeting now under way is highly unlikely to result in any significant policy change, though the tone of commentary on economic conditions will probably sound more upbeat,” McKelvey wrote in a note to clients. Goldman is one of the 18 primary dealers that trade directly with the central bank.
Withdraw Programs
The FOMC will probably discuss how to withdraw unprecedented programs to revive credit, including purchases of $1.43 trillion in housing debt, economists said.
“I continue to expect slack resources, together with the stability of inflation expectations, to contribute to the maintenance of low inflation,” Bernanke said in a written response to questions from Senator Jim Bunning, a Kentucky Republican.
Consumer prices advanced 0.4 percent in November, quickening from the 0.3 percent gain in October, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of economists before the Labor Department reports the figure today. Prices climbed 1.8 percent from a year earlier, the survey shows.
A separate report today will show housing starts rose, according to another Bloomberg survey.
Spread Widens
Yields indicate traders are adding to bets inflation will quicken in the years ahead.
The spread between yields on 10-year notes and Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, or TIPS, a gauge of trader expectations for consumer prices, widened to 2.29 percentage points yesterday, within 1 basis point of this year’s high.
The 10-year yield climbed to 3.62 percent yesterday, the most since Aug. 13, from the record low of 2.04 percent set Dec. 18, 2008.
“We’re getting more and more questions from clients on inflation,” said Marc Fovinci, head of fixed income at Ferguson Wellman Capital Management Inc. in Portland, Oregon, which has $2.8 billion in assets. “The economy is starting to recover. Yields are going to go up next year.”
Ten-year rates will advance to 3.70 percent by the middle of 2010, according to a Bloomberg survey of banks and securities companies, with the most recent forecasts given the heaviest weightings.
Ferguson Wellman is favoring corporate bonds, Fovinci said. It is also sticking to shorter-maturity securities, which will fall less than longer-term debt if interest rates rise, he said.
Annual Loss
Treasuries have declined 2.8 percent this year, while corporate bonds returned 26 percent, according to indexes compiled by Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch unit. Investors sought higher-yielding assets as the U.S. economy grew.
Treasuries fell yesterday as the U.S. producer price index increased last month more than forecast. A separate report showed industrial production also increased.
“The economic numbers have been better than expected and with PPI showing more-than-expected inflation, we are starting to see a backdrop that makes the market nervous,” said Larry Milstein, managing director in New York of government and agency debt trading at RW Pressprich & Co., a fixed-income broker and dealer for institutional investors.
The 1.8 percent increase in prices paid to factories, farmers and other producers was more than twice as large as anticipated and followed a 0.3 percent gain in October, according to Labor Department data.
The Fed will hold its target rate through the first six months of 2010, Bloomberg surveys of economists show.
To contact the reporter on this story: Wes Goodman in Singapore at wgoodman@bloomberg.net.
