Treasuries Finish Choppy Trading Day Roughly Flat

(RTTNews) - After trending lower over the past few sessions, treasuries showed a lack of direction throughout much of the trading day on Monday.

Bond prices gave back ground after an early advance and spent the rest of the day lingering near the unchanged line. The yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, eventually ended the day up by less than a basis point at 4.143 percent.

The choppy trading on the day came as traders seemed reluctant to make significant moves amid a lack of major U.S. economic data.

Later this week, the Commerce Department is scheduled to release the Federal Reserve's preferred readings on consumer price inflation, which could impact the outlook for interest rates.

A number of Fed officials, including Fed Chair Jerome Powell, are also scheduled to deliver remarks over the next several days.

During remarks at the Economic Club of New York this afternoon, new Fed Governor Stephen Miran argued for sharply lower interest rates.

Miran, who voted to cut rates by 50 basis points at last week's Fed meeting, said he believes the "appropriate fed funds rate is in the mid-2 percent area, almost 2 percentage points lower than current policy."

"I am committed to bringing inflation sustainably back to 2 percent," Miran said. "However, leaving policy restrictive by such a large degree brings significant risks for the Fed's employment mandate."

Amid another relatively quiet day in terms of economic data, trading on Tuesday may be impacted by remarks by several Fed officials, including Powell.