The Federal Reserve's purchases of mortgage-backed securities are affecting the supply-demand balance of MBS collateral in the repurchase markets, according to a Barclays Capital report. This has narrowed the one-month term repo MBS spread to Treasury collateral to 2 basis points from 14 bps in March when the Fed began its purchases, according to a June 15 report by Joseph Abate, a U.S. fixed income strategist at Barclays Capital. "At the same time, usage of the Federal Reserve's [Term Securities Lending Facility] for schedule one collateral (essentially MBS) has evaporated, with no bids at any of the collateral swap auctions for several weeks," said Mr. Abate, in his Weekly Collateral Update report.
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