By Regina Hing, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Treasury prices rose Tuesday, with weak consumer spending data putting more pressure on central banks meeting this week to offer new policies to boost growth.
Yields on 10-year notes 10_YEAR -1.66% , which move inversely to prices, fell 3 basis points to 1.47%.
A basis point is one one-hundredth of a percentage point.
Yields on 5-year debt 5_YEAR -2.76% declined 2 basis points to 0.60%.
Thirty-year yields 30_YEAR -1.01% fell 3 basis points to 2.55%.
Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, fell 0.1% in June, marking the second straight month of decline. Analysts expected an increase of 0.1%. Read more on consumer spending.
The data comes amid mounting calls for the Federal Reserve, which convenes its two-day policy meeting Tuesday, to take bolder action to jumpstart the stalling economy.
“Fed-speakers have been communicating that all options are on the table at this meeting – which if anything only adds to the uncertainty,” analysts at CRT Capital Group said in a note Tuesday.
Investors also eagerly await a decision from the European Central Bank, which is scheduled to meet on Thursday. Expectations are high for the region’s policymakers to take more concrete action after ECB President Mario Draghi last week promised to do “whatever it takes” to save the euro.
“The market’s looking for a decisive move to free up capacity to buy additional peripheral sovereign debt, as well as strides toward shoring up the euro-zone banking system in an attempt to spur retail credit creation,” CRT analysts said.
Regina Hing is a MarketWatch reporter, based in New York.
