Since mid -July this year, the US Treasury yield has taken the pace of accelerated rising. The yield on the 2 -year US debt has refreshed the highest in the past 17 years;Breaking 5%and set a record high in the same period; the yield rate of 30 -year US debt also reached the highest point of 16 years in the past. The market predicts that US debt still has room for boarding.The overall line of US debt yields reflects the structural hidden dangers of the US economy. At the same time, it also transmits risks to the global market, adding a lot of uncertain factors to the economic growth prospects of different economies.
The US economy itself is hard to escape
Although the increase in the yield of government bonds, especially long debt yields, is an important indicator of the US economic growth tendency to optimize, from the perspective of government investment, the size of the US government's existing government bonds has reached 33 trillion US dollars (about 45 trillion yuanXinyuan), the end of this year will exceed $ 34 trillion, and the increase in national debt yields means a increase in debt repayment costs.At the same time, the Federal Reserve is continuing to "shrink the table" and is affected by the increase in interest rates of government bonds. The "shrinkage" has caused the Federal Reserve to lose more than $ 100 billion throughout the year.The loss of the Fed means that the profit of the Ministry of Finance has reduced profits, and the expansion of expenditures has accompanied the enthusiasm of the account, and the investment of public finance cannot be squeezed.
Look at corporate investment again.Behind the rise in U.S. debt yields is the strengthening of the US dollar interest rate. While the indirect financing costs of enterprises have increased significantly, the increase in US debt yields will inevitably lead to rising corporate bond interest rates and drive the increase in indirect financing costs of enterprises.Especially in the US bond market, there are currently $ 1.3 trillion corporate junk bonds. The rise in bond yields will not only increase the cost of debt repay, but also increase the difficulty of credit damage and re -financing of issuers.The risk of bankruptcy expands.Data show that as of September this year, more than 78 US companies have applied for bankruptcy protection, and the number of bankruptcy in the company has set the largest record in 13 years.
Consumption end is more cruel.On the one hand, 10 -year US debt yields have risen, and the 30 -year mortgage interest rate has been pushed to 8%, which is the highest level in 2000.Investors' willingness to buy houses has continued to decline, and the application for mortgages has fallen to the lowest level of 28 years, and house sales have reached the slowest growth rate since 2010.On the other hand, the interest rate of new federal direct student loans in the 2023/2024 academic year rose to 5.5%, which was 0.51 and 1.77 percentage points higher than the previous two years. At the same time, the average interest rate of the five -year new car loan rose to the highest since 16 years.Affected, the latest October University of Michigan's consumer confidence index has set the largest single -month decline in one and a half years.
Calendar pressure of non -American developed economy
The yield of national debt on non -US -American developed economies based on the euro zone and Japan has always maintained a very sensitive resonance relationship with US debt yields in history.In the cycle of the US bond interest rate increase in this round of US debt rates, the 10 -year German Treasury yield of 10 -year German Treasury bonds in the euro zone is close to 3%for the first time in 12 years; the yield of 10 -year Treasury bonds in France has risen to the highest level since 2011; Italian 10 -year Treasury bond returnsLeveraged for the highest 11 years; Japan's 10 -year Treasury yield was on the highest position in 10 years.The key to the problem is that according to statistics from the International Financial Association, the increase of more than 80%of the new debt this year from the developed economy is from the developed economy. While the increasing national debt yield has significantly increased the cost of government debt repayment, it has also increased public finances andRisk of sovereign rating.In particular, the total amount of debt in the euro zone is as high as 2.4 trillion euros, exceeding 140%of the GDP (GDP). The sovereign rating is only one step away from the garbage level.The International Monetary Fund (IMF) issued a warning that high debt has led to the impact of crisis by governments in various countries.
Like the United States, the euro zone also has corporate garbage bonds of up to 411 billion euros (about 596.7 billion yuan), and the yield of such bonds priced at the euro is directly led by the national bond yield.The "spread" formed with government bond yields in the end has expanded to the largest in the past seven years, which is equivalent to the rise of the former's rising slope and higher interest rates.What's more important is that while the risk of higher interest rate default scares investors, the euro zone does not support the abundant liquidity of junk bonds like the United States, which means that the issuance of garbage bonds is easier to miscarriage.Therefore, for companies with low bonds in the euro zone, bond yields have the most severe blow.The number of bankruptcy companies in Germany in 2023 has set the highest level in 20 years; the annual output of French companies has increased by more than 40 % year -on -year.Affected, Germany and France have continued to be in a contraction range since the since this year.
For Japan, the 10 -year -old bond yield rising space is sealed by the yield curve control policy (YCC).The Bank of Japan has pushed into the more embarrassing situation of adjusting YCC.On the one hand, the cost of maintaining the original state of the policy is that the yen continues to weaken and may bear the risk of foreign capital outflows. At the same time, the functional attributes of the Japanese yen as the third largest risk aversion currency will also be greatly weakened, and international capital will not be ruled out that it will attract short international capital shorts.Power is a further blow to the yen.On the other hand, if the central bank has adjusted YCC, the yield of Japanese Treasury bonds and corporate debt interest rates must increase, the cost of debt issuance and debt repayment of the government and enterprises will increase, and the public and commercial investment capabilities will be greatly flattened.EssenceMore importantly, once YCC turns, it will inevitably make the inflation upward pattern that is easy to get, and the Japanese economy may reproduce the danger of shrinkage.
Emerging markets encounter brutal pouring
Except for a few economies such as China, the sovereign credit of emerging market countries is not high, and the degree of internationalization of currencies is very low. It is very difficult to rely on local currency foreign financing.Lobricity, so debt with US dollars has become the most important choice for emerging markets.Observations have found that since 2015, the total amount of foreign debt denominated by emerging markets has continued to rise, and as of now, the total scale has exceeded 4.3 trillion US dollars.With the rise of US debt yields, emerging markets bear not only the pressure of debt repayment costs, but also the ability to repay is questioned and concerns about debt restructuring and debt breach of contract.According to an analysis report from the International Clenging Bank, a total of 13.7 billion US dollars sovereign bonds in emerging markets have expired this year. If the US debt interest rate continues to rise, some developing countries will have the risk of deferred or unable to repay.Creditors negotiate debt reorganization; Zambia and Bolivia are trying to seek rescue from the International Monetary Fund; more countries such as Argentina, Egypt, Turkey, and Georgia are more and more tear.
In fact, as the main body of bond issuance, under the inverted pressure of the increase in US debt yields, the greater the risk of breach of contract in emerging market countries, the greater the difficulty of achieving financing, and the higher interest rates.According to the data compiled by Bloomberg, a total of 21 emerging market economies have been soverected to US dollar bonds this year, which is about 1,000 basis points from US Treasury bonds, of which Ethiopia and Russia have the highest premium, close to 50 percentage points.This situation is reflected in the secondary market, the decline in bond prices will also be more serious, and it is more likely to be the key target of speculators to short; in turn, it will also increase the high risk of push push for yields, thereby increasing financing costs.For emerging market countries, the bond yield -breach of contract risk -financing costs actually constitute a negative feedback relationship, and the balance sheet will also become worse with the expansion of the financing scale.
As stated before, behind the rising yield of US debt, it is highly driven by the US dollar interest rate.The US dollar has lowered the currency of emerging markets, the local currency continues to weaken, and the emerging market relying on the US dollar's foreign financing becomes more and more strong and helpless.Data show that last year, the global emerging market US dollar bond financing scale was US $ 103 billion, and this year expanded to $ 150 billion. The increase in the increase in the increase in borrowing costs under the increase in US debt yields can be imagined.OneNoodles, in order to make financing smoother, many emerging market countries have shifted to higher -yield junk bonds, but based on credit risk concerns, the market is unwilling to follow up.Since the second half of last year, in addition to Guatemara, Uzbekistan, Trinida, and Dubago, in the second half of this year, they have obtained a small -scale high -yield debt financing of $ 2.4 billion.Essence
The author is a director and professor of economics of the Chinese Market Society
