Quick takes on key economic data, Greece debt deal, U.S. earnings.

Rates drop back to record lows after Fed says it’ll hold overnight rates near-zero until late 2014.

FOMC meeting starts today. Weekly retail sales reading down.

Politics makes for some incredibly bad fiscal policy. Bad fiscal policy creates bad monetary policy.

Rates started the day up, but have since dropped. Here’s why.

Slowing retail sales temper 4Q GDP expectations. Plus rest of today’s stats, and Fed meeting preview.

Jobs -ADP Private jobs for October +110,000 -Previous was +91,000 vs. consensus of 100,000 -Full report Challenger Job-Cut Report -Announced layoffs for October were 42,759. -Down sharply from the previous month’s 115,730 which saw a large number of jobs lost in the U.S. Army. -Together ADP and Challenger paint a picture of modest jobs growth [...]

Rates were even to end last week after +/- .25% daily swings, and are still up .25% from all-time record lows set October 3-4. Another huge week ahead: Fed and ECB rate meetings, October jobs report, lots more earnings, and Europe’s debt crisis slogs on. Below I recap last week, then preview what’s coming. And [...]

Rates rose .25% last week as mortgage bonds sold 4 of 5 days on (weak but) better than expected economic data. Rates rise when bonds sell, and rates have now risen to lose the entire dip that came after the Fed’s September 21 commitment to keep rates low. This rate rise comes as headlines scream [...]

Remember QE1 from January 2009 through March 2010? The Fed bought $1.25 trillion in mortgage bonds during that time. So now they collect money when loans payoff on refis and also when borrowers make their payments. And last week the Fed said they’d use this money to buy more mortgage bonds starting October 3. This [...]