Treasuries Close Nearly Flat Following Lackluster Session

(RTTNews) - Treasuries showed a lack of direction throughout much of the trading session on Thursday before closing roughly flat.

Bond prices spent the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, edged down by less than a basis point to 2.319 percent.

The lackluster performance by treasuries came as traders reacted to remarks by a number of Federal Reserve officials amid renewed concerns about the outlook for interest rates.

Fed Chair Janet Yellen delivered welcoming remarks at a Fed conference on post-crisis monetary policy but did not specifically discuss the outlook for rates.

Separately, St. Louis Fed President James Bullard said it would be prudent to move monetary policy closer to normal levels now that the goals have been attained.

New York Fed President William Dudley also said the risks of moving too quickly or too slowly are nearly balanced but emphasized that a December rate hike will depend on incoming data

Meanwhile, Chicago Federal Fed President Charles Evans had a more cautious tone and said it could be "well into" next year before the inflation goal to support a rate hike is reached.

Bond traders were also reacting to the results of the Treasury Department's auction of $16 billion worth of thirty-year bonds, which attracted slightly above average demand.

The thirty-year bond auction drew a high yield of 3.070 percent and a bid-to-cover ratio of 2.41, while the ten previous thirty-year bond auctions had an average bid-to-cover ratio of 2.32.

The bid-to-cover ratio is a measure of demand that indicates the amount of bids for each dollar worth of securities being sold.

On the U.S. economic front, the Labor Department released a report this morning showing that initial jobless claims came in flat in the week ended November 7th.

The report said initial jobless claims came in at 276,000, unchanged from the previous week's unrevised level. Economists had expected jobless claims to dip to 270,000.

Following some quiet days in terms of U.S. economic news, trading on Friday may be impacted by reports on retail sales, producer prices, and consumer sentiment.