Treasury Yields Rise

Published September 26, 2025

U.S. Treasury yields rose mid-week as markets digested the latest economic data on new home sales. Yields held steady later in the week after a decline in jobless claims helped ease concerns about a weakening labor market.

On Wednesday, the Commerce Department’s Census Bureau released their monthly report on sales of new single-family homes. The report revealed a 20.5% increase in the sales of new homes, reaching a seasonally adjusted annualized 800,000 homes in August. This marked the highest level since January 2022 and surpassed analysts’ expectations of 650,000 units. On a year-over-year basis, new home sales increased 15.4%.

“We were expecting a gain but not that large,” said chief economist at the National Association of Home Builders, Robert Dietz. “Always important to remember the margin of error for new home sales is large. We’ll need to wait for revisions next month and the September data point to see if this is smoothed out.”

The benchmark 10-year Treasury note yield opened the week of September 22 at 4.13% and traded as high as 4.20% on Thursday. The 30-year Treasury bond opened the week at 4.75% and traded as high as 4.79% on Thursday.

On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Labor reported that initial claims for unemployment decreased by 14,000 to 218,000 for the week ended September 20, below analysts’ expectations of 235,000. Continuing unemployment claims totaled 1.93 million, a decrease of 2,000 claims from the prior week.

"Today’s report refutes any theories that layoffs have suddenly taken off,” said chief economist at High Frequency Economics, Carl Weinberg. “It also undermines calls for more and bigger rate cuts, both at the Fed and in the market.”

The 10-year Treasury note yield finished the week of 9/22 at 4.18%, while the 30-year Treasury note yield finished the week at 4.76%.