Treasuries Close Roughly Flat After Seeing Early Weakness

(RTTNews) - After moving to the downside early in the trading day, treasuries regained ground over the course of the session on Thursday.

Bond prices climbed well off their early lows, eventually ending the day roughly flat. The ten-year yield inched up by less than a basis point to 4.346 percent after reaching a high of 4.376 percent.

Treasuries ended the day little changed amid uncertainty about President Donald Trump's trade policies, as he continues to threaten higher tariffs on various sectors and countries.

In a Truth Social post Wednesday evening, Trump announced a 50 percent tariff on copper is due to go into effect on August 1st.

Trump also posted several more letters to world leaders on Truth Social revealing plans to increase tariffs.

Trump posted letters sent to the leaders of the Philippines, Brunei, Moldova, Algeria, Iraq, Libya and Sri Lanka after posting letters sent to the leaders of 14 other leaders earlier in the week.

On the U.S. economic front, the Labor Department released a report showing first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits unexpectedly edged modestly lower in the week ended July 5th. The report said initial jobless claims dipped to 227,000, a decrease of 5,000 from the previous week's revised level of 232,000.

Economists had expected jobless claims to inch up to 235,000 from the 233,000 originally reported for the previous week.