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Sunday, November 7, 2010

The biggest bubble is bursting?

If someone asks you to lend some money for 30 years and you will be paid by about 4% or so per year, will you be happy and lend the money? You may guffaw for such a stupid request. I agree and I won't, period. But wait, there are many, or probably say a huge amount of people indeed willing to do so. Who has such a magic power to lure people into such an obvious trap? The US government! Since the financial crisis, the yield of the long-term government bonds has been coming down relentlessly to the laughable 4% or so for a 30 years commitment and the bond price has increased substantially (the bond yield and the price have an inverse relationship). I honestly don't understand there will be anyone with a right mind to buy such bonds at such a low yield but of course there are so many things out there beyond my understanding. People think it is safer to park their money in the US government bonds, although to me this is a guarantee to lose money if you factor in the potential inflation over the 30 years period. I have heard many market gurus calling it the biggest bubble in brewing. I'm not sure if it is THE biggest but I agree it is at least a huge bubble. Check TLT, which tracks the long-term bond prices.

It looks like the tide is changing its direction. While many people were expecting further reduction of the long-term bond yield (meaning increasing prices of the bonds) following the Fed's initiative of a huge money printing, the result has actually been just the opposite. Since the Fed's purchase of the bonds are mainly those up to the 10 year period, there is not enough money left to push further down the yield of the 30 year bonds. Investors started to realize that there would be a huge risk of inflation down the road with the Fed's reckless money policy, which will certainly cause the collapse of the long-term bonds. So it may be a good timing to start bet against the long-term US government bonds. The easiest way to do so is to buy TBT, which corresponds to twice (200%) the inverse (opposite) of the daily performance of the Barclays Capital 20+ Year U.S. Treasury Bond index. Certainly there will be up and down, especially if the market corrects when many people will run to the treasury bonds again for safety. However, I firmly believe the long term trend is clear that the US treasury bonds will lose its value, and big time! Again, the best way to safely establish your position is to use the dollar averaging technique. Make up your own mind!

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