Treasuries are notably weaker today as the yield on the ten-year approaches 4% and the Long Bond Future trades closer to the official threshold for a bear market (20% decline from a peak). This morning's weakness has been attributed to reports that Russia may diversify some its foreign reserves out of Treasuries into bonds issued by the IMF.
Given that the Treasury is auctioning off $19 billion in 10-Year Treasuries today, it is understandable that investors are concerned about less demand from foreign countries for US debt. The only problem is that this morning's story is not really new news. On May 27th, the IMF announced that Russia had agreed to buy up to $10 bln in its first ever bond issuance. So while there are plenty of other concerns out there regarding the US Treasury market, if you're selling bonds based on the headlines this morning, you are trading based on last month's news.
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