Bonds news

With last year’s recession out of the way, it seems the bond market is at it again. Experts say the market is sending another downturn signal. Just like in 2019, the spread between different bonds or the yield curves is starting to get tight anew, after yesterday’s five basis points difference between the three-month and the 10-year Treasury bonds. Whenever the three-month Treasuries top the 10-year benchmark, that is described as an...

This week’s Fed meeting will be one of the most anticipated and the stakes are undoubtedly high, amid a slump in the Chinese economy occasioned by an outbreak of the Coronavirus. Reports this morning indicate the death toll has risen to 106 and the number of infected people is estimated at slightly over 2,000. US government bond prices were low earlier this morning with concerns over the virus triggering demand for fixed income assets. At around...

Japanese fund managers say local investors’ appetite was fast-growing having purchased emerging-Asian bonds on record in 2019. During the first eleven months of last year, Japan investors gobbled up about $9 billion (approx. 1 trillion yen) of Asian debt, and this is according to recent data from balance-of-payments (BOP). While the data is a month short of a year, it is the highest since 2005. Last year’s Fed bank’s move to ease the markets seem...

UK’s head of Debt Management Office (DMO) has expressed concerns over the issuance of green state bonds. Sir Robert Stheeman poured cold water on the case saying it would be more costly to the public compared to conventional gilts. Sir Stheeman’s office is mandated with raising billions of pounds each year for the UK government through bond markets. According to the government official, issuance of green bonds that are meant to impact...

London-headquartered multi-national bank, Barclays Plc and data service provider FactSet have agreed to collaborate to foster transparency on the “opaque” bond market. Barclays is one of the oldest financial institutions globally, having existed for more than 325 years. Chief Executive Jes Staley currently steers the bank, and it said on Wednesday that it would release to the market a tool that analyses the liquidity status of more than 22,000 bo...

It is now official that of the 11,600 investors that invested in the inoperative bondholder London Capital & Finance (LCF), only 159 would be compensated. The Investment firm was permanently closed after it was involved in one of the kingdom’s largest savings scandal after the 1988 Barlow-Clowes collapse. It has now been a year since LCF was liquidated and administrators appointed to oversee compensation and winding up. The company went under...

Following the assassination of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani on Friday last week, bond investors have been shifting to government bonds triggering a sharp decline in the US government debt. It would appear the high risk associated with bonds that boosted the stock markets last year is slowly wearing off despite the Fed’s intervention. Since Jan. 1 to date, the benchmark 10-year Treasury yield has dropped 10 basis points. The benchmark al...

Over the last two decades, it was a rule of thumb for almost all financial advisors: Investors should put 60% of their investment in stocks and 40% in bonds. The balance was presumed to be the “perfect” shield against falling stock prices while benefiting from potential growth. For a while now, the narrative has been sold by market players such as financial advisors, banks, traders, and analysts. Savings and retirement funds have also been religi...

How good have Canadian stocks performed over the last decade? It’s simple: investors would be better off investing in guaranteed government bonds and avoiding risky and volatile equities. A combined bond investment of provincial, municipal and federal bonds returned 94% amid the financial crisis. But central banks boosted economic growth due to lowered interest rates, stimulating bond prices as they typically rise when interest rates fall. All in...

Investors are now thinking about bond investment in a whole new way, thanks to the changing market dynamics. Savvy investors have moved away from the old age adage that required one to hold a bond portfolio equal to their age (at the age of 30, you should be 30% in bonds; age 40, 40%; and so on). Steve Cassaday, CFP, president of Cassaday & Company, Inc., an investment management and financial planning firm in McLean, Virginia says: “The real...

It wasn’t business as usual for “burrito bond” investors after being informed that they could lose 90% of their investments or up to 99% if the company is placed under receivership. About a month ago, The Guardian published an article highlighting that UK-based Mexican restaurant chain Chilango, was in talks regarding the future of the entity. News of the restaurant’s financial distress came as a shocker to hundreds of small-scale investors who u...

Government bond yields throughout the world surged Thursday and Friday following signs that the China and the US had reached a trade deal that will curtail the impact of the months-long antagonism between the two countries. In the US, the yield on the 10-year government bonds recorded the highest jump since 2016. According to Tradeweb, the 10-year Treasury note rose from Wednesday’s 1.786% to 1.82% on Friday, signalling its highest jump sin...

Christmas has come early for a few lucky investors who subscribed to the premium bonds. Last month, several people walked away with prizes ranging from £1 million to £100,000 to £25 and this month is no different. Each month, premium bond investors are randomly selected for different categories of cash prizes. This month’s biggest winners walked away with £1 million each; the first bond-winning number is 309GV354472 belonging to a Stockport-based...

China’s bond traders are not having it easy making money in a market that hardly moves. Investors have been casting their nets far and wide to boost returns, with 10-year notes recording the narrowest range in seven years. This year to date, the 10-year bond yield of China has dropped only 9 basis points, missing an August global rally that boosted the world’s negative bonds to a new high of $17 trillion. And in October, The People’s Bank of Chin...

It has certainly been an eventful year for the bond markets. For the better part of this year, the US Treasury returns, which are known to have an inverse relationship with bonds had been on a downward trend before a bailout from the country’s reserve bank and other global players including the Bank of Japan and the European Central Bank. The year has also registered some of the lowest interest rates in the history of bonds. Global debt con...

TS Lombard Managing Director of Global Macro Dario Perkins said that the stagnation being experienced in the bond markets today is similar to the one in the depression of the late 1800s. The US two/ten-year bond curves have seen multiple inversions in the past year followed by low returns, which is transposed to price in Europe and beyond. Inverted yield curves are primarily considered sinistrous to the economy and they indicate on a chart a peri...

Most armchair investors get excited at the idea of speculative bonds, which promise far much greater returns compared to the conventional ones. However, most of the mini-bonds have been at the center of mega scandals such as the downfall of London Capital & Finance (LCF) that led to the loss of money belonging to nearly 12,000 investors. The twelve-month ban by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) will commence in January 2020, but the FCA i...