SocGen’s Albert Edwards is out with a new note today – one which he says he wasn’t going to write – but felt compelled to do so anyway due to the ongoing rout in the US bond market, which has prompted the following question that Edwards tries to answer: Is the Ice Age over?… of as he elaborates:

“As the bond rout continues, the biggest call investors have to make is whether the break of the multi-decade downtrend marks the end of the secular bull market. This is the big one. Get on the wrong side of a new multi-year bear market in government bonds and all investment portfolios will be shredded to ribbons, as bonds are the cornerstone of most equity valuation models.”

To Edwards this is a familiar question because as he explains, it is “exactly the same bold heading box I wrote in my Global Strategy Weekly of 13 June 2007.” As he recalls, “the rout in the bond market back then was even more savage than it has been in recent weeks, with the 10y yield rising from 4¾% in mid-May 2007 to the 5¼% peak on 12 June, just one day before I wrote the words above, pondering the possible end of the secular bull market for Government bonds.”

Furthermore, just like now, yields were also set to break out above the secular downtrend and respected bond investors such as Bill Gross were, just like now, calling for the end of the secular bull market. Referring to a chart from SocGen’s head of technical analysis, Edwards points out that the break in the 10y above 2.8% was not the key level that could mark the end of the secular bull market, but rather it was the 3.05% zone as shown in the chart below. Indicatively, earlier today the 10Y hit 3.09% after reaching as high as 3.11% yesterday.

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