Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Bonds move stocks and currencies

Today the Fed announced that (among other things) it will buy Treasuries to help bolster the recovery (read: prevent a recession). This announcement, other things equal, should push up prices of Treasury bonds, push down their yields, push up stock prices, and also move currencies. People will expect that the Treasury yields will fall (or stay low), that return-seekers will be less likely to invest in dollar denominated assets and more in other currencies, leading to sales of dollars and purchases of other currencies, leading to a fall in the value of the dollar.

This analysis is nothing new, of course, but I do enjoy living in today's world of technology where such moves can be observed in real-time. Here are the post-announcement screenshots from Yahoo Finance:

(I am still pessimistic about the Dow)

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