Weekly
The weekly read on what the data and the markets mean.
- August 23, 2026 Treasury Will Double Its Long-Bond Buybacks in September; Strong Data Took the Rally Back in Two Days
The Treasury said on Wednesday it would at least double the size of its buybacks of 10-to-30-year bonds, overriding a schedule it had published two weeks earlier; the larger operations do not begin until September 9. Thirty-year yields fell nine basis points on the announcement, then rose through Thursday and Friday on strong factory surveys and costlier oil to close at 5.27% — above where they started, and below Monday's 5.31%, the highest close since June 2007. Hours after the announcement, the July FOMC minutes showed many participants judging that tightening would likely be necessary if inflation did not decline. Over the week the 30-year's inflation-protected yield fell while its nominal yield rose.
- August 17, 2026 The Case for a September Hike Came Apart; the 30-Year Auctioned at Its Highest Yield Since 2001 Anyway
September hike odds fell from about 55% on Monday to roughly 30% by the weekend as core CPI printed its smallest 12-month rise since February, producer prices went flat, and retail sales fell 0.6% — yet Thursday's $25 billion 30-year auction stopped at 5.216%, the highest since 2001, and the 30-year closed the week at 5.25%, two basis points under its 2026 high. The New York Fed will also make no reserve-management purchases through mid-September, the program's first pause. Short-maturity investors traded the meeting; long-maturity investors were pricing a Fed that won't say how it decides.
- August 8, 2026 The First Negative Payroll Month Since 2020 Cut September Hike Odds Nearly in Half
The first negative payroll month since 2020 cut September hike odds nearly in half, and the S&P 500 set two record closes in a week — but the jobs report that did it is the year's most ambiguous, the oil relief came from a tentative Hormuz deal, and the Treasury quietly softened its own borrowing language. Gold rose 7% to a seven-week high while 30-year yields eased only to 5.19%: the cyclical scare faded; the structural repricing didn't.
- August 1, 2026 30-Year Yields Hit Their Highest Since 2007 in the Week Core Inflation Slowed
The Fed held 9–3, core PCE rose just 0.1% in June, and 30-year Treasury yields still closed at 5.27% — their highest since July 2007. The three facts don't share one cause: September odds fell because of the hold, stocks recovered on earnings, and long-maturity yields rose because demand for long Treasuries is weakening while Warsh questions how much support the Fed's balance sheet should provide. Also this week: the first joint US–Japan yen intervention in about three decades, and a levered AI fund's forced sale to Citadel.
- July 25, 2026 The Case for a Hike Came Back at $100 Oil, Without an Inflation Report
The case for a hike that a negative CPI killed two weeks ago came back at $100 oil — July hike odds went from 12% to 38% and September to about 82% without a single inflation report, on what the IEA calls the largest disruption in the history of the global oil market and jobless claims at a 1969 low. Equities punished the same AI spending the Fed counts as an inflation driver: Alphabet raised its capex guide and fell 7%. Wednesday's decision is the first genuinely live meeting of the Warsh era, and the quarter's GDP and PCE data land the morning after it.
- July 11, 2026 The Chip Rout and the Near-Record Index Are One Event
Semiconductors have lost about $2.1 trillion in value since June 22 — the median chip stock is down 21% — while the S&P 500 sits half a percent from its record. Both are one event: money rotating out of the AI leaders into the other 459 stocks. Under it, investors moved to about 70% odds of a Fed hike by September after minutes that scrubbed the easing bias; oil spiked and faded on Iran, June's home sales confirmed the North–South housing split, and Tuesday's CPI will print a negative headline from an oil collapse that has already partly reversed.
- June 26, 2026 Cheaper Oil Isn't Cooling the Services Core
The bet on rate cuts rested on falling oil. This week oil kept falling — WTI down more than 10% to $70 as the Strait of Hormuz reopened — and the bet broke anyway, because core PCE hit a three-year high on services inflation that cheaper oil never touches.
- June 20, 2026 The No-Hike Bet Rests on Oil Staying Down
Investors dismissed the Warsh Fed's higher-rate projections because the oil shock collapsed — but this week the floor under cheaper oil took its first hits, and core PCE on June 25 can't settle it.
- June 19, 2026 Warsh's Fed Projected a Hike Investors Don't Believe
The Warsh Fed flipped its forecast to a 2026 rate hike the market isn't pricing — the same week oil collapsed 25%.
- June 7, 2026 Everything Is a Rates Trade Now
A jobs print well above consensus broke a ten-week rally and turned every asset into a bet on the Fed.