U.S. Treasuries flat as investors await 3-year, 10-year auction

The U.S. Treasuries remained slightly lower ahead of the 3-year auction, scheduled to be held today by 17:00GMT, besides the 10-year note auction, due on August 9 by 17:00GMT.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury, rose nearly 1 basis point to 2.26 percent, the super-long 30-year bond yields hovered around 2.84 percent and the yield on short-term 2-year note traded nearly flat at 1.36 percent by 12:50GMT.

Financial markets started the second week of August in steady mode, with low trading volumes and few variations, especially on stock markets, where share prices remained broadly steady and global stocks hit all-time highs (see). Despite this, investors remained cautious and FX volatility inched up, following unanimous UN on North Korea

Sovereign bond yields inched down, continuing their downward trend started in July, after Fed Chair Janet Yellen’s relatively cautious speech about the uncertainty of inflation, leading investors to reassess monetary policy normalization to a slower pace than previously expected. Moreover, Friday’s market reaction to strong US payroll data faded somewhat. The US dollar inched down, while the euro recovered some ground, despite June’s worse-than-expected industrial production in Germany. The Fed interest rate hike probabilities in 2017 remained below 40 percent.

The most noteworthy US data this week will come on Friday with July’s consumer price inflation. Principally reflecting the recent pickup in energy prices headline CPI is expected to post the first monthly increase in three to leave the year-on-year rate rising 0.2ppt 1.8 percent y/y. But this would still remain some way below the average so far this year. And core CPI is forecast to remain unchanged at 1.7 percent y/y for the third consecutive month, the joint-lowest rate for two years.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 Futures traded 0.13 percent down at 2,473.88 by 12:50GMT, while at 12:00GMT, the FxWirePro's Hourly Dollar Strength Index remained lightly bullish at 92.61 (a reading above +75 indicates a bullish trend, while that below -75 a bearish trend). For more details, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex

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