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Daily Market Update 3/11/14

Rates were little changed Tuesday following the release of weaker than expected economic data.  January Wholesale Inventories rose 0.6%, a bit more than forecast, while sales by wholesalers fell 1.9%, the most in nearly 5 years.  An increase of 0.2% had been expected.  Mortgage-backed securities initially moved higher on the report, but reversed course after the top Democrat and Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, Tim Johnson (D., S.D.) and Mike Crapo (R., Id.), introduced a bill to overhaul Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.  The bill calls for replacing Fannie and Freddie with a system of federally insured mortgage securities in which private insurers would take initial losses before U.S. government guarantees would be triggered.  The bill faces an uphill battle to gain support (for different reasons) from the most liberal and conservative members of the Senate.  Also, many industry and consumer interest groups are likely to resist major changes to the current system.  Fannie and Freddie have now repaid the U.S. Treasury all of the bailout funds received since the firms were taken over by the government in 2008.

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