bonds

Here in Washington, the city is abuzz over the crisis engulfing the Trump Administration. But politics are less important to markets than one might expect, despite markets being forward-looking. That’s because it’s often hard to judge what…

What happened in 2010 with Greece, Spain, Portugal and Ireland will happen again. But this time, Italy will be the first domino to fall. And when it does fall, Italian sovereign and bank credit risk will skyrocket. Caveat Emptor.

Given recent hawkish Fed statements and the potential for even more than three hikes, all of this is bullish for longer-duration Treasuries but much less so for auto ABS, high yield and emerging markets.

The 98,000 jobs added to payrolls in the US in March were well below the consensus estimate of 178,000, especially when you consider downward revisions to January and February totalled 38,000. I don’t believe this matters for the Fed…

I am going to start commenting on the weekly jobless claims figure more actively because I like it as a real-time indicator. For me, it is the best real-time data point we have on how the employment picture intersects with consumption…

Starting in 2007, global markets were buffeted by a series of financial and economic crises that created the greatest deflationary scare since the Great Depression. We have left out-and-out crisis mode. But the challenges are still…

This chart speaks volumes about the Trump rally.

Imagine you could issue 30- or 50-year paper today at 3 or 4%. And you have a strong suspicion that - in the future - 2-year paper won’t be 1.15% like it is today. You think it could be 4, 5 or 6%. Why not lock in the long-term rates of…

The problem with the Trump administration’s talk about lengthening the maturity of debt issuance is that it confuses the future path of interest rates with the steepness of the yield curve. They talk about locking in low rates. And what…

One of the lead stories at Bloomberg this morning is an article about foreigners shying away from “financing the US government”. And the conclusion of this article is that it could mean higher interest rates in the US. Is this conclusion…