Treasuries Give Back After Early Rally But Close Modestly Higher

(RTTNews) - After moving higher over the course of the previous session, treasuries saw further upside during trading on Thursday.

Bond prices gave back ground after an early advance but managed to remain in positive territory. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, dipped 2.3 basis points to 4.233 percent.

The ten-year yield fell as low as 4.174 percent in early trading amid lingering concerns about the economic outlook following the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement on Wednesday.

The Fed announced its widely expected decision to leave interest rates unchanged, but forecasts suggest officials still expect to resume cutting rates later this year.

However, the Fed officials also lowered their projections for GDP growth in 2025 to 1.7 percent from 2.1 percent and raised their forecasts for consumer price growth this year to 2.7 percent from 2.5 percent.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell said during his post-meeting press conference that a "good part" of the higher inflation forecast is due to tariffs.

Buying interest waned over the course of the session, however, as a report from the National Association of Realtors unexpectedly showing a significant rebound by existing home sales helped ease concerns about the strength of the economy.

NAR said existing home sales surged by 4.2 percent to an annual rate of 4.26 million in February after tumbling by 4.7 percent to a revised rate of 4.09 million in January.

The sharp increase surprised economists, who had expected existing home sales to slump by another 3.2 percent to an annual rate of 3.95 million from the 4.08 million originally reported for the previous month.

Looking ahead, trading activity on Friday may be somewhat subdued amid a lack of major U.S. economic data on the day.