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Stocks Snap Their Skid on Friday, but the Holiday-Shortened Week Still Ends Lower After August CPI
All four major US benchmarks closed higher Friday as crude eased and the August inflation report landed, yet every one of them finished the four-session week down. Core CPI ran hotter than the consensus Schwab cited, and futures pricing for next week's FOMC moved sharply toward a hike.
Three coupon settlements, a corporate tax date and an FOMC meeting all land on Sept. 15
Fed staff published new estimates last month for how hard Treasury settlement pushes on repo rates once reserves stop being abundant. Next Tuesday supplies the test, and the Fed will be in blackout when it happens.
Rate futures head into the Fed's blackout window with a September hike still a live question
Short-dated Treasury yields rose on Friday after the August employment report landed far above forecasts. With Fed officials now barred from public comment until Sept. 17, futures pricing has become the only running commentary on the Sept. 15-16 meeting.
Hike Odds Climb Past 60% and US Crude Slides Under $90 as the Tape Splits After Payrolls
CME FedWatch pricing for a September increase rose to 60.2% Friday from 49.4% Thursday, the Associated Press reported. On AP's morning snapshot the two-year Treasury yield led the move while the 10-year held steady, and benchmark US crude fell 2.6% to $88.96 a barrel.
The 30-Year Treasury Closed September's First Session at 5.27%, Level With the 20-Year and Near Two-Decade Highs
Treasury's official par yield curve put both the 20-year and the 30-year bond at 5.27 percent on Tuesday, September 1, leaving 88 basis points between the two-year and the long bond. The pressure is not a purely American story: Bloomberg reported the same session that German 30-year yields were at their highest since 2011, the UK equivalent at levels last seen in 1998, and Australian long yields at a record in data going back to 2016.
September Opens on the Back Foot as Crude Climbs and the Long End Holds Near Multi-Year Highs
US stocks were lower across the board in Tuesday morning trade after two tankers were struck near the Strait of Hormuz overnight, sending crude higher and the volatility index up more than 6%. Monday's session had already closed lower, with the Dow shedding 374 points even as August ended as a winning month.
Crude Jumps After U.S. Strike on Larak Island as Energy Leads a Lower Tape
U.S. Central Command said American forces hit two Iranian launchers on Larak Island; Iran struck back at bases in Jordan. Brent traded above $91 and WTI above $86 in Monday morning dealing, and energy shares were the standout sector on a broadly lower morning tape. The August monthly close is not set until 4 p.m. ET.
Iran Sanctions and New Canada Tariffs Split Monday's Tape as Wall Street Waits on Nvidia and Jackson Hole
Stocks opened Monday pulling in two directions, with technology lagging while industrials held up, as traders waited on a Treasury sanctions announcement on Iran, absorbed the collapse of U.S.-Canada trade talks and the 50% tariffs that followed, and positioned ahead of Nvidia's Wednesday results and the Jackson Hole symposium. Figures for Monday are intraday and the session is still open; Friday's closes are the last settled levels.
Bessent says the buybacks could run past $4 billion per issue. The long end gave back about half his relief rally inside a day.
One day after Treasury doubled planned repurchases of longer-dated debt to $4 billion per operation, the 30-year yield gave back about half of the decline it had just made, and the Treasury secretary went on television to say the size could go higher still. The 30-year touched 5.33 percent on Tuesday, a 19-year high, fell to 5.183 percent on the announcement, and was last trading at 5.24 percent late Thursday — still below where it stood before Treasury spoke.
Treasury Doubles Long-End Liquidity Buybacks to at Least $4 Billion an Operation, Starting September 9
The Treasury Department raised the size of its nominal long-end liquidity support buyback operations from a $2 billion maximum to at least $4 billion apiece in the 10- to 20-year and 20- to 30-year sectors, effective September 9 through November 4. Long-dated yields fell on the announcement, with wire services putting the 30-year down roughly 9 to 10 basis points on the day.
Foreign Official Flows Swung $88.3 Billion in June. The Headline TIC Number Moved $2.0 Billion.
Treasury's June capital-flows report, out at 4 p.m. Monday, showed a net TIC inflow of $133.5 billion against a May figure the same release revised to $131.5 billion. Inside that near-identical total, the official line went from a $39.9 billion outflow to a $48.4 billion inflow while private inflows fell by half. Treasury's own footnote warns that the official-private division carries a "transaction bias."
Treasury's Buyback Schedule Adds Up to Exactly $38 Billion. Two of the Operations Printed on It Don't Count.
The August refunding's buyback plan lists 18 liquidity-support operations, but only 16 belong to the new quarter, and the maximums reconcile to the dollar.
The Treasury Clearing Mandate Is 136 Days Away. Three Exemption Requests Are Still Open, and the Comment Windows Close Aug. 31.
The SEC's central clearing requirement for U.S. Treasury cash transactions takes effect Dec. 31, 2026. A statement from Commissioner Mark T. Uyeda dated Aug. 7 shows the Commission is still taking comment on three separate requests to carve pieces out of the rule, with all of those windows expected to close Aug. 31 — 122 days before the mandate bites. Two of the three were noticed in April, and the Commission has now reopened the comment period on both.
The Foreign Holdings Data Lands Monday at 4 p.m. The Line That Has Been Moving Is the Official One
Treasury publishes June's international capital data on Monday, August 17. In the current table, foreign official holdings of Treasuries have fallen to $3,848.0 billion, the lowest of the thirteen months on the page, while the headline total sits within $118.3 billion of the highest column published.
The High-Yield Average Is Hiding Its Tail
The broad junk-bond index sits near the low end of its recent range. The CCC cohort sits above 1,000 basis points. As of Aug. 13, 2026, the distance between the two rating tiers was the widest of the year, and the two halves of the credit market are no longer describing the same borrowers.
The 30-Year Stopped at 5.216%. What the Tape Did Next Was Not a Straight Line.
Treasury's $25 billion long bond cleared at a high yield of 5.216% on August 13, the costliest long-dated borrowing since 2001. But the bond rallied roughly four basis points that same afternoon before giving it back Friday — and the widely circulated "6.6 basis point tail" is not a tail at all.
Russell 2000 Closes at a Record as the Dow Finishes the Week Alone in the Red
Small caps set a closing high on a day the other three indexes slipped. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq stretched their weekly win streaks to three; the Dow did not join them.
Reddit Joins the S&P 500 on Tuesday. The Mechanics Are the Story, Not the Pop.
S&P Dow Jones Indices adds RDDT before Tuesday's open in place of AvalonBay. J.P. Morgan puts the passive bid near 16.7 million shares — but the index effect is not what it used to be.