Analysis
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Corporate borrowers face a split screen: spreads near their tights, all-in yields at multi-year highs
Investment-grade spreads have sat at 81 basis points every session so far in September while average high-grade yields ran above 5.5 percent. The gap explains why treasurers are pulling 2027 funding into 2026, and why the window narrows this Friday.
Two Line Items - Restaurants and School Districts - Account for Most of August's 162,000
Food services and drinking places added 59,000 jobs and local government education 42,000, together 101,000 of the month's 162,000. Information payrolls fell 23,000 and health care hiring ran well under its own 12-month average.
Jobless Claims Edge Up to 206,000 as Announced Layoffs Jump 58% From July
Weekly filings rose by 2,000 and continuing claims ticked higher, while Challenger, Gray & Christmas counted 52,881 announced August job cuts — sharply above July but still well under last year's pace. Friday's August payroll report is the next test.
The Wage Channel Is the Weakest Link in the Case for a September Rate Increase
ADP put median base pay growth for workers who stayed in their jobs at 3.0 percent in August, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics had average hourly earnings running at 3.2 percent in the year to July. Whatever is keeping inflation above target, the pay data published so far does not look like a wage-price spiral, which complicates the argument for tightening into a labour market that is visibly narrowing.
Analysis: The One Number in the ISM Report That Didn't Move — Prices at 71.1% for a 23rd Month of Increases
Every major component of August's ISM manufacturing survey softened except the cost gauge, which held exactly where it was in July. Steel, aluminum and petroleum-based inputs are doing the work, and the sources of all three are largely outside the Federal Reserve's reach.
The Two-Year Did the Repricing: 14 Basis Points on Friday, and a Flatter Curve Into September
Treasury's own par yield series shows the two-year note jumping to 4.34 per cent on August 28 from 4.20 per cent the day before, while the 30-year moved four basis points. The spread between two- and 10-year yields narrowed to 39 basis points, and the Russell 2000 fell 1.39 per cent while the Dow was flat.
The Payroll Benchmark Revision Lands at 10 a.m. Friday. That Is About the Same Minute Warsh Is Expected at the Jackson Hole Podium.
BLS will publish the preliminary benchmark estimate for March 2026 on Friday at 10 a.m. ET. Last year's preliminary figure was minus 911,000 — and the final came in about 50,000 jobs shallower.
Wednesday Stacks July PCE, the Second Q2 GDP Estimate and Durable Goods at 8:30 a.m. — Then Nvidia Reports After the Close
Three federal releases share one 8:30 a.m. ET slot on Aug. 26, and the company that makes up 7.50% of the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF reports that evening. The advance second-quarter GDP estimate put growth at a 1.5% annual rate with the PCE price index running at 5.1%. Nvidia's own guidance calls for revenue of $91.0 billion, plus or minus 2%. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's Jackson Hole keynote follows two days later.
Two Authorities, One Curve: Treasury Bids the Long End on the Same Day the Fed's Minutes Lean Tighter
Between August 3 and August 17 the 2-year constant-maturity yield fell 6 basis points while the 30-year rose 8, steepening 2s30s by 14 basis points to 112. On Wednesday the Treasury moved to support the long end and the FOMC minutes showed three dissents for a hike at the short end.
The 30-Year's 2026 Selloff Is 43 Basis Points of Real Yield and 2 of Inflation Compensation
Treasury publishes two long-end curves. Subtract one from the other and this year's move at the back of the curve is almost entirely a real-rate story.
Two Tapes Disagreed With the Disinflation Story on Friday, and Both Were Energy and Rates
July CPI rose 0.1%, producer prices were unchanged and retail sales fell 0.6% — the cleanest week of soft data in months. Yet Treasury yields finished Friday above the Federal Reserve's official Thursday marks and crude gained more than 5% on the week. What follows is an account of that tension, and an unusually blunt accounting of where the price providers do not agree.
July's FOMC Minutes Land Wednesday. The Forecast Is Stale; the Conditions Are Not.
The Federal Reserve releases the record of its July 28-29 meeting on Aug. 19, after five data releases have already reshaped September pricing. What survives is not the committee's view of the economy but the conditional logic behind it — and under a chair who has scrapped forward guidance, that logic has few other places to appear.
A Soft Consumer Print Lands Five Days Before the Hawks Get Their Minutes
Three Fed officials dissented in July in favor of a hike. The minutes of that meeting arrive Wednesday — and by then they will describe a committee that had not yet seen the jobs report, the inflation data or Friday's retail sales miss.
Softer Inflation Moved the Front End. The 30-Year Barely Noticed
Thursday's producer price report knocked the odds of a September rate increase down hard, yet Treasury yields barely moved and the long end held above 5.2%. The repricing happened in policy expectations, not in the bond market — and Friday's data is where that gap gets tested.
Three hawkish dissents make the August 19 Fed minutes the most important document of the month
The July FOMC held at 3.50% to 3.75% by a 9-3 vote, with Hammack, Kashkari and Logan all wanting a quarter-point hike. The minutes will show how close the rest of the committee was — and how it described a labor market that has since cracked.