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Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

reuters.com

151–160 of 185 posts

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#151

France is in a dire situation right now. 10y OAT are at 4.5% and rising with almost 100bps difference with Germany and no budget for 2027 since there is no majority in the parliament. There is also a 6% deficit expected and growth has been revised down to 0.4% although during the first 6 months of 2026 there was actually a decrease of 0.2% of GDP in total so finishing the year in recession is totally possible. Unempl…

> and no budget for 2027 since there is no majority in the parliament.

The French government can pass laws without a vote in the parliament under Article 49.3 of the constitution. I think the last budget was adopted in this way.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#152
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no way to grow the US economy AI and robotics. Engineering is becoming cheaper. Graphics design is becoming cheaper. Lawyering is becoming cheaper. Entertainment, film, and gaming (not hardware) is becoming cheaper. This will eventually hit manufacturing and logistics and critical inputs. We'll be able to have an entire robotic supply chain domestically save for raw materials. It will hit drug design and m…

It's always possible to make the number go up by divorcing the number from any real-world meaning. I think the "Singularity", as AI proponents call it, will actually happen, and will likely happen pretty close to its predicted date of 2029. It's just that the form it'll take will be "I'll have your AI talk to my AI", AI botnets clickfrauding AI ad networks, AI newspapers serving up content to AI social media users, A…

> Meanwhile, actual humans go fuck off to raise their kids while being paid by AI finance and HR departments

I was able to suspend my disbelief until this line. Unless Capitalism has been upended by 2029, AI companies will continue to have capitalist goals like maximizing value for their shareholders. AI HR won't pay humans that don't positively move the needle on the P&L

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#153
post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Debt service costs as a percent of GDP are in fact lower than they were in the 1980's This is an amazing use of the "in fact" trope, in exactly the same misleading way[1]. I talked about debt, and you casually shifted to servicing costs which presumes that rates stay historically low...when they're actually rapidly rising. Comical. In the 1980s, the debt to GDP ratio was less than half what it currently is. Rates w…

Double replying because I missed this accusation: > It's also simply a lie I don't know what you're trying to cite but your numbers are wrong per FRED: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1YCNz

>I don't know what you're trying to cite but your numbers are wrong

To be clear, my statement was-

"The highest historic servicing cost was 3.2% of GDP. It is currently projected at 3.3%, and that presumes rates don't keep spiralling up."

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/fyoigda188s

That ends at the beginning of 2025, and already it was equalling the historic max (which was during a brutal recession, it should be noted). Since then the debt has added trillions more (about $4T), and the rate due on that debt has kept increasing. Oh, and the debt of the US is increasing quite a clip faster than the US economy is "growing", even with the fantasy numbers from the sharpie presidency.

Yeah, jabroni, my statement is 100% confirmed fact. Indeed, it's incredibly optimistic, really, because if rates follow current trends, things are going to get dramatically worse by year end.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#154

France is in a dire situation right now. 10y OAT are at 4.5% and rising with almost 100bps difference with Germany and no budget for 2027 since there is no majority in the parliament. There is also a 6% deficit expected and growth has been revised down to 0.4% although during the first 6 months of 2026 there was actually a decrease of 0.2% of GDP in total so finishing the year in recession is totally possible. Unempl…

> and no budget for 2027 since there is no majority in the parliament. The French government can pass laws without a vote in the parliament under Article 49.3 of the constitution. I think the last budget was adopted in this way.

It can try but it could also be toppled by doing so. Last year the government had something to trade with the socialists (postponing the increase of the retirement age) so without the support of the socialists, the motion to topple the government failed.

This year is different. Macron is on his way out and everyone wants to stay as far away as they can from him including his former prime ministers who are both running in the election.

That means that there is literally nothing they can offer to the opposition to avoid being toppled. If a parti were to agree to not topple the government on the 49.3 motion, they would be signing their own death warrant for the election.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#155
post #61
post #40

It becomes clearer to more people that it's impossible to predict the future shape of the global economy due to AI. The more clear it is, the cheaper 30 year bonds become.

> It becomes clearer to more people that it's impossible to predict the future shape of the global economy due to AI. You mean due to Trump? Tariffs and Iran war caused this.

Your local American tariffs can hardly explain a global rise in long term yields. The Iran war isn't going great economically but doesn't explain thks. If anything the Russia-Ukraine war has had a bigger influence.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's always possible to make the number go up by divorcing the number from any real-world meaning. I think the "Singularity", as AI proponents call it, will actually happen, and will likely happen pretty close to its predicted date of 2029. It's just that the form it'll take will be "I'll have your AI talk to my AI", AI botnets clickfrauding AI ad networks, AI newspapers serving up content to AI social media users, A…

> Meanwhile, actual humans go fuck off to raise their kids while being paid by AI finance and HR departments I was able to suspend my disbelief until this line. Unless Capitalism has been upended by 2029, AI companies will continue to have capitalist goals like maximizing value for their shareholders. AI HR won't pay humans that don't positively move the needle on the P&L

It would be interesting if AI actually did optimize the P&L at most companies.

Right now, the vast majority of office jobs are bullshit jobs, because the director who holds the budget is incentivized to maximize headcount rather than P&L. The job is not strictly necessary, but if the money is not spent, it disappears, and so the director has an incentive to ensure everything is spent.

The reason these jobs can continue to exist is because of poor information flow within the organization. Directors distort both the importance and required resources for the projects they're working on, making them seem harder and more lucrative than they actually are. It's notoriously difficult to credit an actual transaction back to a particular product feature that made someone buy, so there is no actual verification of these. Then these project proposals are looked at by an FP&A analyst who has maybe 5 minutes to evaluate each, so of course 100 headcount to maintain a 3-screen CRUD mobile app seems reasonable.

A rational, omniscient AI would look at this and say "This is ridiculous. I can code this app in 50ms." And so if we actually did put AI in charge of the P&L, they would likely fire 100% of the employees, as well as doing other shady stuff like charging all stored credit cards multiple times, gaslighting consumers as to the existence of the product, and DDoSing the court system.

But again, this strengthens my thesis. So the AI has now fired 100% of the humans in the workforce and is running amuck with the financial system. What do the remaining 100% of unemployed people do? Start trading their skills for old-fashioned analog currency, like gold coins or even paper dollars. They just disconnect the AI, turn off the computers, and go about their daily business.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Meanwhile, actual humans go fuck off to raise their kids while being paid by AI finance and HR departments I was able to suspend my disbelief until this line. Unless Capitalism has been upended by 2029, AI companies will continue to have capitalist goals like maximizing value for their shareholders. AI HR won't pay humans that don't positively move the needle on the P&L

It would be interesting if AI actually did optimize the P&L at most companies. Right now, the vast majority of office jobs are bullshit jobs, because the director who holds the budget is incentivized to maximize headcount rather than P&L. The job is not strictly necessary, but if the money is not spent, it disappears, and so the director has an incentive to ensure everything is spent. The reason these jobs can contin…

> Right now, the vast majority of office jobs are bullshit jobs, because the director who holds the budget is incentivized to maximize headcount

This may have been briefly true during the Zero-Interest regime. The economy isn't doing so hot right now, outside of AI. If squeezed companies doing multiple rounds of layoffs keep those "bullshit jobs", maybe they are not bullshit. Perhaps coordinating people, and keeping up with bureaucratic demands like paying taxes, not breaking the law and growing the business requires warm bodies.

> What do the remaining 100% of unemployed people do? Start trading their skills for old-fashioned analog currency.

History books suggest a different outcome. Firing 100% of employees in a growth-based, consumer economy only works when you're the only one using that strategy. If a critical mass of companies do the same, then you're staring at a managed decline at best.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So name one. These politicans have names, do they not? We do have the name of one politician who balanced the New York City budget though. Its probably not going to please a lot of people to hear that guy's name though. But that's what people want, right? Balanced budgets? But no. That's not what people want and we all know it.

One aspect of that balanced budget that should be noted is that it does rely on a sizable funding increase from the state government. Now, that state is legally required to have a balanced budget itself, so perhaps this is a small side note rather than a major change in perspective. I just think it’s not spoken about enough when discussing how that budget process went.

NYC had a deficit of $12 Billion before the current mayor.

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Italian and Greek bonds now have lower yields/rates (i.e., considered lower risk(?)) than US bonds That's not what rates indicate. its one component, but its far from a straight line from higher rates to more risk. You can't really compare bonds that pay in different currencies by Rate alone.

Why not? Percentage is the same for dollars as it is for yen or franks or pesos

> Why not? Percentage is the same for dollars as it is for yen or franks or pesos

That's a fair question if you aren't int he industry. Inflation would be the best example of why you can't do that.

Would you rather have a Zimbabwe bond that pays 10%(when they had 10,000% inflation a year) or a US bond that pays 5%

Re: Global bond yields hit 2008 highs, raising stakes for big borrowers

#160

Turns out countries with constitutions forbidding excessive debt are quite smart. It's like phone addiction -- if the parents don't lead by example and strictly enforce "no phones at the dinner table" then slowly it's just gonna creep back in and everyone's just staring at their phones again.

Debt is easy to deal with for a sovereign. Just dilute the currency. That will obviously happen before a debt crisis is allowed to materialize. And so the rich will get richer. The real problem is not the debt, but the social instability caused by the measures taken to address the debt.

This would also make countries that constituionally prevent that level of debt look smart. At least if we see the state as an institution that should serve its citizens. If taking on debt requires making your citizens worse off to the point that it causes social instability that didn't serve them very well

If you see the state as an institution to allow the rich and powerful to extract resources from the rest of the population, then it's all fine. Just take out some debt to give a contract to your nephew, then pay it back by devaluing the currency

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