Initial Weekly Jobless claims lower than expected

Published Date 5/23/2024

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Today's Mortgage Rate Summary

How Rates Move:

Conventional and Government (FHA and VA) lenders set their rates based on the pricing of Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS) which are traded in real time, all day in the bond market. This means rates or loan fees (mortgage pricing) moves throughout the day, being affected by a variety of economic or political events. When MBS pricing goes up, mortgage rates or pricing generally goes down. When they fall, mortgage pricing goes up.

Rates Currently Trending: Higher

Mortgage rates are moving higher today. The MBS market worsened by -10 bps yesterday. This was not enough to increase mortgage rates or fees. The market experienced low volatility yesterday.

Today's Rate Forecast: Neutral

Housing: We will get April New Home Sales at 10 am ET.

Jobs: Initial Weekly Jobless Claims were lower than expected, Weekly Claims were 215K versus estimates of 220K. The four week moving average ticked up a smidge to 219K. Continuing Claims remained below 1.8M with at 1.794M reading.

The Fed: Today we will hear from Bostic again. The April Chicago Fed National Activity Index was dismal, contracting by -0.23. The prior month (March) was originally in positive territory with a reading of 0.15 but it was revised back into negative territory of -0.4.

Today's Potential Rate Volatility: High

This morning markets are moving towards higher rates. Volatility is high but should mellow some towards the end of the day.

Bottom Line:

If you are looking for the risks and benefits of locking your interest rate in today or floating your loan rate, contact your mortgage professional to discuss it with them.

Source: TBWS

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