Tuesday’s federal election and a sequence of U.S. labor and borrowing updates framed Monday’s bond market, where Dow Jones reported a rise in the two-year yield and declines at longer maturities.
At 2:19 a.m. ET (07:19 UTC), the two-year yield was 4.595%, up 1.5 basis points. Tradeweb data cited by Dow Jones put the 10-year yield at 4.924%, down 0.4 basis point, and the 30-year at 5.301%, down 0.7 basis point.
The U.S. Treasury’s daily par-yield curve listed 4.56% for two-year securities, 4.94% for 10-year notes and 5.31% for 30-year bonds on Oct. 30. Those official daily readings are from a different date and use a different basis from Monday’s intraday snapshot.
The federal midterm election is Tuesday, Nov. 3. All 435 U.S. House seats and roughly one-third of Senate seats are on the ballot, according to USA.gov. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has scheduled its September Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) for 10 a.m. ET that day.
The BLS calendar also lists third-quarter productivity data for Thursday, Nov. 5, at 8:30 a.m. ET and the October Employment Situation report for Friday, Nov. 6, at the same time. In September, U.S. nonfarm payroll employment increased by 29,000 and the unemployment rate was 4.2%, the BLS reported.
The Treasury’s quarterly refunding announcement, a scheduled government borrowing update, is set for Wednesday, Nov. 4. Andrew Wells, chief investment officer at SanJac Alpha, told Dow Jones, “I think everyone is more interested in what Treasury does with buybacks.”
Oil benchmarks also fell. Reuters reported that at 5:20 a.m. ET (10:20 UTC), West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures were at $99.71 a barrel and Brent crude futures at $108.64, each down 4.2%. Reuters linked the move to hopes for diplomatic progress and said Iranian negotiators had spoken with Qatari mediators about ending the war with the United States. The report said a draft proposal was circulating but did not confirm an agreement.
The next political and labor-market events are Tuesday’s election and the JOLTS release at 10 a.m. ET.
