Brian Chappatta, Columnist

The Bond Bear Market of 2018 Never Really Came

Sure, it was a tumultuous year for Treasuries. But fears of a doomsday were overblown.

December 31, 2018 at 11:09 AM UTC

Brian Chappatta is managing editor of Bloomberg News' leveraged finance and distressed debt teams. He was previously managing editor and team leader of its wealth group. Before that he was a Bloomberg Opinion markets and finance columnist and a bonds reporter for Bloomberg News.

Not much of a bite.
Photographer: William Vanderson/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

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That proclamation, mere days into the New Year, set the tone for the $15.6 trillion U.S. Treasury market in 2018. Not only was it the subject of the most-read article of the year on the Bloomberg terminal among U.S. rates and foreign-exchange news, but it ushered in a new shorthand for projections of higher yields. Later in January, Bridgewater Associates founder Ray Dalio said the bond market had slipped into a bear phase. “A 1 percent rise in bond yields will produce the largest bear market in bonds that we have seen since 1980 to 1981,” he said.