Stock market today: Stocks rise amid big bank earnings, inflation data

Reasonable quarter from JPMorgan (JPM) this morning. Read more from our banking reporter David Hollerith.

I was optimistic on JPM's earnings media call and asked CFO Jeremy Barnum for his thoughts on housing after the Fed rate cut. After all, it didn't seem to be taking the form of a housing boom at a lower rate – but activity did increase.

Here's what Barnum told me (emphasis ours):

“What we've seen, as you would expect, is a pickup in mortgage applications and a tiny bit of an increase in refinancing there, which, again, you would expect. But it's worth noting, when it comes to mortgages, that all the sequential and year-to-year changes are coming from a very low base, and it still remains that the vast majority of outstanding mortgage stocks in the country right now are below 6%, and many of them are still at 5%. below it.

So it would take a really big rally on the long end of the yield curve to see a significant pickup in refinancing. The home view on home prices, you know, I think generally you've got a tension between probably a little bit of a weak economy that should create a little bit more supply, there's a little bit more construction, but there's generally a housing shortage. the country So the housing market seems to me to be still a bit stuck, I would say.“