Bond Market Update

Data Recon

• Retail sales declined 0.9% month-over-month in May (Briefing.com consensus -0.6%) following a downwardly revised 0.1% decline (from 0.1%) in April. Excluding autos, retail sales fell 0.3% month-over-month (Briefing.com consensus 0.1%) following a downwardly revised unchanged reading (from 0.1%) in April.
  • This was not a good report in terms of hard economic data. It reflected a more cautious-minded consumer, who, in general, pulled back spending on goods. Clothing and accessories store sales (+0.8%) were a surprising outlier, but otherwise, there was a retrenchment in spending in many discretionary categories, including electronics and appliance store sales (-0.6%) and food services and drinking places (-0.9%). This report will help support arguments that the Fed should be cutting rates soon.
• Industrial production fell 0.2% month-over-month in May (Briefing.com consensus 0.1%) following an upwardly revised 0.1% increase (from 0.0%) in April. The capacity utilization rate was 77.4% (Briefing.com consensus 77.7), down from an unrevised 77.7% in April. Total industrial production increased 0.6% yr/yr while the capacity utilization rate was 2.2 percentage points below its long-run average.
  • The key takeaway from the report is that manufacturing output was little changed in May despite the announcement in early April that the reciprocal tariffs would be paused. The tepid activity is consistent with slower economic growth in its own right and likely also reflects the planning uncertainty that goes hand-in-hand with the tariff uncertainty.
• Yield check:
  • 2-yr: -1 bp to 3.96%
  • 3-yr: -1 bp to 3.92%
  • 5-yr: -3 bps to 4.01%
  • 10-yr: -3 bps to 4.43%
  • 30-yr: -3 bps to 4.93%