Treasuries Give Back Ground Amid Strength On Wall Street

(RTTNews) - After moving notably higher over the two previous sessions, treasuries gave back some ground during trading on Thursday.

Bond prices moved steadily lower throughout the session before closing firmly in negative territory. As a result, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, climbed 6.4 basis points to 1.573 percent.

The pullback by treasuries came as stocks moved back to the upside on the day, lifting the Dow and the S&P 500 to new record intraday highs.

Stocks benefited from a sharp increase by the price of crude oil, which rebounded after showing a notable decline in the previous session.

After tumbling $1.06 to $41.71 a barrel on Wednesday, crude oil for September delivery jumped $1.78 to $43.49 a barrel

The rebound by the price of crude oil came after Saudi Arabia's Energy Minister said oil producing nations may discuss possible action to stabilize the market at a meeting next month.

Treasuries saw some further downside following the release of the results of the Treasury Department's auction of $15 billion worth of thirty-year bonds, which attracted below average demand.

The thirty-year bond auction drew a high yield of 2.274 percent and a bid-to-cover ratio of 2.24, while the ten previous thirty-year bond auctions had an average bid-to-cover ratio of 2.35.

The bid-to-cover ratio is a measure of demand that indicates the amount of bids for each dollar worth of securities being sold.

On the U.S. economic front, the Labor Department released a report this morning showing that initial jobless claims edged slightly lower in the week ended August 6th.

The report said initial jobless claims slipped to 266,000, a decrease of 1,000 from the previous week's revised level of 267,000. Economists had expected jobless claims to dip to 265,000.

A separate report from the Labor Department showed an unexpected uptick in import prices in the month of July.

Trading on Friday may be impacted by reaction to U.S. reports on retail sales, producer prices, and consumer sentiment.