The U.S. dollar gained a little strength

Stocks closed in negative territory as CaseShiller home price numbers came out at a multi-year low.
In the bond space, there was some selling and profit-taking in financial bonds on the back of Monday's rally and tightening in credit spreads.
Overall trading volumes were very light on a variety of factors: Spring Break vacation for many school-children, impending earnings season, and no real imminent negative catalysts.
Add the fact that quarter-end is this week and the market's lethargy makes sense.
Even trading activity in recently issued bonds, usually the most liquid and active segment, was slow.
But in a sign of the bullish technical factors in the market most recently issued bonds are still trading at tighter spread levels than where they were issued.
In the primary bond new issue market, books (indicative of demand) are still building strong: demand for a 5 year UBS covered bond was more than $3 billion (they ended up printing $2 billion).
There were headlines about a gas leak at the rig level of one of Total's stations in the North Sea.
CDS (credit default swap) spreads for Total closed 15-20 basis points wider and the stock was down.
Information is scarce to say the least; had this happened before the notorious BP oil spill it would probably have been a non event.
Treasury bonds caught a bid and the U.S. dollar gained a little strength.
President Obama's healthcare reform may hit a roadblock in the U.S. Supreme Court.
For better or for worse, the healthcare debate has cost Obama a lot of political blood and has yielded little thus far.
In Syria, Assad is buying time by agreeing to a peace plan put forward by Kofi Annan.
Ironically, the longer Assad continues to brutalize his people, the more iron-clad the final consensus will be to remove him and dismantle his inward-looking and repressive security apparatus.
Durable goods order numbers are out on Wednesday.