The latest Market Talks covering FX and Fixed Income. Published exclusively on Dow Jones Newswires throughout the day.

2048 ET - Asian currencies are mixed against the dollar, but may be buoyed by the U.S. Treasury Department's announcement on Wednesday that it'll buy back more of its longer-term bonds. The dollar seems to be under pressure, strategists at OCBC Group Research say in a research report. The Treasury's announcement "helped cap long-end U.S. yields," they say. It "signals Treasury's discomfort with the rise in long-term yields and should help restrain further increases in long-end yields in the near term," they add. The U.S. dollar falls 0.3% to 4.0420 ringgit, but is little changed at 1.2713 Singapore dollar and is 0.2% higher at 1,390.70 won, LSEG data show. (ronnie.harui@wsj.com)

2043 ET - The U.S. dollar fell by around 0.8% in U.S. and European trading, weakening against all major currencies. The main catalyst was the U.S. Treasury's announcement that its buyback operations for securities dated from 10 to 30 years were being increased. The buyback operations allow the Treasury to buy older off‑the‑run bonds and replace them with Treasury bill issuance. The news was widely interpreted as a signal that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was concerned about the recent surge in long‑end yields, says Kristina Clifton, FX strategist at CBA. The 10-year and 30-year yields fell by around 7 and 10 basis points, respectively. (james.glynn@wsj.com; X @JamesGlynnWSJ)

2026 ET - The JGB yield curve flattens in the early Tokyo session, tracking U.S. Treasurys' yield curve flattening overnight. JGBs and Treasurys tend to move in tandem. The U.S. Treasury said Wednesday that it'll buy back more of its longer-term bonds in order to mitigate a sharp increase in borrowing costs. "What the Treasury has done is kind of bought a bit of reprieve from the [rising yield] trend, and we've certainly that in a fallback in longer-end yields," says Taylor Nugent, senior economist at NAB, in commentary. The 10-year JGB yield falls 4.5 bps to 2.845%, while 20-year yield drops 7.5 bps to 3.700%. (ronnie.harui@wsj.com)

2015 ET - Japanese shares are higher in early trade, tracking Wall Street's gains overnight. Following the recent surge in Treasury yields, the U.S. government "calmed investors by announcing plans to expand purchases of long-dated debt, which eased liquidity concerns and signaled officials are prepared to step in to stabilize markets when borrowing costs rise too far, too fast," says Axel Rudolph, chief technical analyst at IG, in an email. Among the best performers on Japan's benchmark index, Shimano rises 4.9%, Daiichi Sankyo adds 4.7%, and Shiseido is 4.0% higher. The dollar is at 158.33 yen, compared with Y159.15 around Wednesday's Tokyo market close. The Nikkei Stock Average is up 0.6% at 65745.13. (ronnie.harui@wsj.com)

1938 ET - Japanese stocks may rise, tracking Wall Street's gains overnight. The U.S. government's announcement on Wednesday that it would buy back more longer-dated Treasurys may calm market fears over a further bond selloff and spur investors to flock back to the stock market. Nikkei futures are 540 points higher at 66370 on the SGX. The dollar is at 158.25 yen, compared with Y159.15 around Wednesday's Tokyo market close. The Nikkei Stock Average closed 3.2% lower at a two-week low of 65326.42 on Wednesday. (ronnie.harui@wsj.com)

1922 ET - The U.S. buyback of longer-dated debt, while immediately reducing 30-year bond yields by about 7 basis points, is relatively small, says Kieran Davies, chief macro strategist at Coolabah Capital. While the purchase of bonds and open-ended comments by policymakers can have a sustained effect on yields, the purchases usually have to be extremely large to have significant effect, he says. The Treasury announcement also does nothing about the drivers of higher bond yields, such as the demand for debt from government and tech companies, and the continuing risk of that inflation stays above the 2% target, he adds. (james.glynn@wsj.com; @JamesGlynnWSJ)

1550 ET - Treasury yields settle mixed as the U.S. government plans to buy back more of its long-term debt. The Treasury department doubles to $4 billion the cap for buybacks of 10- to 30-year maturities. A 20-year bond auction shows signs of firm demand, although the 5.204% yield is the highest since 2023. Fed minutes reveal increasing concern about inflation, but that was before a soft July CPI. Markets mostly price a Fed hold next month. The 30-year yield sheds 0.090 percentage point to 5.194%, the deepest drop since October. The 10-year falls 0.054 p.p. to 4.651%. The two-year rises 0.004 p.p. to 4.178%. (paulo.trevisani@wsj.com; @ptrevisani)

1529 ET - In July's Fed meeting, "some participants commented that financial conditions might not currently be sufficiently restrictive to facilitate a return of inflation to 2 percent." Today's moves in yields---such as lower long-end yields, tighter term-premia and a weaker dollar---only eases financial conditions further, said Matthew Luzzetti, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank. For those officials, "That gives them potentially another reason to think about a need for policy tightening," Luzzetti said.(jessica.coacci@wsj.com)

1432 ET - At the July FOMC meeting, Chairman Warsh discussed limiting the number of Fed meetings to gather more information, suggesting it may be more useful for the committee to have evolved views if there were more time between them, minutes show. "The Chairman observed that six scheduled meetings per year, held roughly every two months, would allow more information to accumulate between meetings than under current practice." However, "The Chairman asked for input from the Committee on these issues, but no decisions regarding possible changes in the meeting schedule were made, and the Chairman indicated that any change in practice would not affect the schedule over the balance of 2026." (jessica.coacci@wsj.com)

1421 ET - On-blockchain lending done through either a CeFi platform like Coinbase or Tether or DeFi providers like Compound, Aave, and Morpho continues to lose steam in 2026, according to a note from Galaxy Research. Combined, crypto-collateralized lending in 2Q 2026 fell by nearly 17% from the prior quarter, totaling $56.2 billion, the firm says. The dollar-denominated value of loans held by DeFi lenders plummeted nearly 28%, to $20.4 billion. While the decreases are large, Galaxy characterizes them as a "steady, stepwise decline," as opposed to a complete collapse of lending volume. "This measured pace points to a much healthier deleveraging cycle, driven by gradual risk reduction rather than forced liquidations or counterparty failures," Galaxy says. (kirk.maltais@wsj.com)

1403 ET - At their July meeting, Fed officials weighed two separate ways that artificial intelligence could pose risks to the economy. First, they worried that the investment boom is inflationary. Several officials thought of AI "as already having broader effects on prices by pushing up aggregate demand or assessed it would likely do so relatively soon," according to the minutes. Second, they worried that AI-fueled stock gains could pose a financial-stability risk. If tech earnings forecasts are revised lower, it "might lead to a broad-based repricing of assets, generate tighter financial conditions, and create strains in financial institutions directly or indirectly exposed to the sector," some participants said. (matt.grossman@wsj.com; @mattgrossman)

1403 ET - The July Fed meeting didn't result in a rate hike, but inflationary risks dominated the conversation about the economic outlook. According to the minutes, "many" officials--the Fed's counting word for a big group who nonetheless didn't make up a majority--continued to think that rate hikes would be needed if inflation didn't cool. Importantly, though, this meeting came before last week's cooler July inflation figures, and before the weaker July jobs report. Those numbers have led traders to pull back bets on a September hike. Plus, there's still another month of inflation and jobs data to come before the Fed's next meeting.