10Y Yields Are Back Above 3% And Oil Is Surging – What Happens Next?

10Y yields rose above 3% again overnight, so I guess Jamie Dimon is getting closer to being “right” all the time.

10Y

I’m just kidding. Jamie Dimon was just spitballing and you people blew his comments out of proportion. But hey, I can’t blame you. “Jamie Dimon Says 10Y Yields Are Headed To 4%” is a good headline when it comes to enticing readers.

The overnight push (back) above the “magic” threshold comes ahead of a $25 billion 10Y auction and amid a further rise in crude. WTI briefly jumped above $71 overnight. Here’s an annotated chart that shows you the whipsaw action from Tuesday, when prices fell on a CNN report, snapped back on an NYT article about Macron and then rose further when Trump spoke:

WTI

To be sure, there are plenty of reasons to believe 10Y yields will remain anchored and that for the time being the dominant mode of the curve will be flattening. We’ve talked a ton about the myriad arguments for why the U.S. long end will continue to find sponsorship. Former trader and current Bloomberg columnist Mark Cudmore is out with something on this on Wednesday. Here’s an excerpt:

Contrary to most hedge funds and analysts out there, I still believe in further flattening of the 2s-10s curve over the medium-term. Treasury 10-year yields at 4% won’t be an issue for markets in 2018. If it is, that implies the U.S. has lost all fiscal credibility and we’ll be in the midst of the next major financial crisis — and it will be worse than last time. But I’m not so bearish — the point I’m making is that there’s no way inflation alone justifies yields getting that high. U.S. 10-year yields have closed above 3% on just one day in the past four years — they never closed above 3.03% in that time.

Duly noted, but in light of recent events, it’s also worth revisiting Deutsche Bank’s contention that rising oil prices could end up being a boon for the dollar in the event they push up inflation expectations. Recall the following excerpts from a couple of late April notes by the bank’s Alan Ruskin: