The Fed Rate Cut Drives Up Long-Term Yields

In September of 2024, the Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 50-points. Long-term yields went up.

The bond market reaction revealed something new to us.

Gone are the days (1999) when a Time headline proclaimed that Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers could save the markets as part of a Committee to Save the World.

The Fed can only lower the Federal Funds Rate — the rate that determines the annual interest rate on overnight deposits between banks and the central bank.

Unlike the dotcom boom and bust, the Fed and Treasury today have to deal with a higher debt-to-GDP ratio and (farther) out-of-control deficit spending.

Bond investors know the game.

So… it’s no surprise, really, that last year’s trend is on repeat, despite the much-bally-hooed rate cut last week:

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Following the Fed’s rate cut last week, bond traders pushed up yields on the 30-year
Treasury from 4.65% to 4.76%. (Source: CNBC)

For now, short-term investors — think money market and savings accounts — will see a drop in their yields.

But… despite Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s best efforts to finance the US government’s mounting pile of debt… longer-dated bonds are offering even higher yields.

For savers, there’s an option to grab those high yields while you can.

~ Addison

P.S.While the bond market is continuing to fight the Fed, defensive asset classes are taking off. Gold is well over $3,700 per ounce. Silver has topped $43 and may be on its way to retest its old highs at $48.

Plus, commodities such as uranium are breaking out after consolidating over the summer, and copper remains near highs. There’s still room for the commodity space to run.

This week on Grey Swan Live!, Portfolio Director Andrew Packer and contributor Shad Marquitz will review the latest developments in the commodity space and determine the best commodity plays through the end of 2025 and into 2026.

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If you have any questions for us about the market, send them our way now to: feedback@greyswanfraternity.com.

In September of 2024, the Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 50-points. Long-term yields went up.

The bond market reaction revealed something new to us.

Gone are the days (1999) when a Time headline proclaimed that Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers could save the markets as part of a Committee to Save the World.

The Fed can only lower the Federal Funds Rate — the rate that determines the annual interest rate on overnight deposits between banks and the central bank.

Unlike the dotcom boom and bust, the Fed and Treasury today have to deal with a higher debt-to-GDP ratio and (farther) out-of-control deficit spending.

Bond investors know the game.

So… it’s no surprise, really, that last year’s trend is on repeat, despite the much-bally-hooed rate cut last week:

Turn Your Images On

Following the Fed’s rate cut last week, bond traders pushed up yields on the 30-year
Treasury from 4.65% to 4.76%. (Source: CNBC)

For now, short-term investors — think money market and savings accounts — will see a drop in their yields.

But… despite Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s best efforts to finance the US government’s mounting pile of debt… longer-dated bonds are offering even higher yields.

For savers, there’s an option to grab those high yields while you can.

~ Addison

Plus, commodities such as uranium are breaking out after consolidating over the summer, and copper remains near highs. There’s still room for the commodity space to run.

Turn Your Images On

If you have any questions for us about the market, send them our way now to: feedback@greyswanfraternity.com.

My mum remembers the gold fever – and indeed the silver fever (silver spiked to $50 three days earlier on January 18). Even today, 45 years on, the silver price is lower than it was then – that’s how insane that spike was.

She recalls people queuing up to sell their family silver. Not to buy it. To sell it.

So that is something I am looking for to tell than this bull market is close to an end: when retail, ordinary people, start selling their physical in droves.

We are not there yet.

After yesterday’s meeting between Presidents Trump and Xi, the world’s two largest economies agreed to reduce the 20% fentanyl-related tariffs to 10%, while Beijing paused its rare earth export restrictions.

The markets would normally have cheered such détente. But investors were still haunted by Jerome Powell’s warning that the Fed may not cut rates again in December. And a renewed awareness that the AI bubble may, in fact, be in the “melt-up” phase… driven by expansive capital expenditures, financed by debt.

In his press conference after lowering interest rates a quarter point this week, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell laid out the case that the AI boom was nothing like the dotcom bubble.

There’s just one problem. The market is following the dotcom boom nearly perfectly – with 2025 following closely to 1998.

Milei, meanwhile, is doing something different. He’s cutting budgets, trimming employees, and chopping off unnecessary bureaucratic appendages. He’s been in office for a little shy of two years. During that time, he’s reduced inflation by about 90% and cut the budget deficit by 100%. Argentina has climbed out of its almost permanent recession to have the fastest growing economy in the Americas, with GDP growth more than twice that of the US. Real wages have tripled. And poverty has been cut by 40%.

She recalls people queuing up to sell their family silver. Not to buy it. To sell it.

So that is something I am looking for to tell than this bull market is close to an end: when retail, ordinary people, start selling their physical in droves.

We are not there yet.

In his press conference after lowering interest rates a quarter point this week, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell laid out the case that the AI boom was nothing like the dotcom bubble.

There’s just one problem. The market is following the dotcom boom nearly perfectly – with 2025 following closely to 1998.