Mortgage-Bond Yields Guiding Loan Rates Rise to Highest in Year

Yields on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage bonds that guide U.S. home-loan rates climbed to the highest in almost a year as Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke told Congress the central bank may cut the pace of bond purchases in the “next few meetings.”

Fannie Mae’s 3 percent, 30-year securities jumped 0.19 percentage point to 2.67 percent as of 4:59 p.m. in New York, the highest since May 29, 2012, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The yields have risen from the record-low 1.97 percent reached in October after the Fed announced it would start buying $40 billion of government-backed housing debt a month to begin its third round of bond purchases known as quantitative easing.