Reading the yield curve's message

If you haven't already heard that an inverted Treasury yield curve is a good predictor of recessions, then either you haven't been reading this blog for long or you haven't been reading much in the financial press of late. (For background, see some earlier posts of mine on the subject here and here.) The subject has become the focus of attention in recent months because the yield curve has been flattening, which in turn has sparked concerns that the risk of recession is rising. These concerns are misplaced, as I explain below.

Chart #1

The top portion of Chart #1 is the standard way to display the status of the Treasury yield curve. It represents the difference between the two lines on the bottom portion: the difference or "spread" between 10-yr and 2-yr Treasury yields. The spread is effectively a measure of the slope of the yield curve, which indeed is relatively flat compared to where it was several years ago. But it's not flat nor is it inverted; it is still positively-sloped, and that means the market believes the Fed is justified in saying it plans to increase rates modestly over the next year or so. The relative flatness of the yield curve is not saying that the Fed is tightening too much or threatening growth, it's best characterized as the market's way of saying that economic growth expectations are neither exciting nor worrisome. I explain this a bit more below.

Chart #2

Chart #2 is another way of looking at the yield curve—a better way, since it gives us some important additional information. The red line in Chart #2 is similar to the blue line in Chart #1, but the blue line in Chart #2 is the important addition: it shows the real, inflation-adjusted Fed funds rate, which is the overnight rate that the Fed targets. The Fed these days has absolute control over the nominal funds rate, while the rest of the nominal yield curve is essentially a projection of what the market thinks the funds rate will average over time. Any yield curve analysis worth its salt should measure not only the slope of the Treasury curve, but also consider the level of the real Fed funds rate.

The Fed doesn't just target the funds rate. What it really targets—but rarely talks about—is the real funds rate. Borrowing money at 5% when inflation is 1% is one thing, but borrowing money at 5% when inflation is 10% is quite another (the former means borrowing is expensive, the latter means borrowing money is a good way to make money). Real borrowing costs are what truly affect behavior. When money is very expensive—when real borrowing costs are high—people are discouraged from borrowing and spending and are encouraged to save money; eventually, if real rates are forced too high, economic activity suffers. That's been the proximate cause of every one of the recessions in the past 60 years.

One thing that stands out in Chart #2 is that the real funds rate has been negative for the past decade. Doomsayers think this means the Fed has been flooding the world with money, and the sky will soon be falling. Monetarists reason that, since we have seen neither a collapse of the dollar nor soaring inflation over the past decade, this can only mean one thing: the demand for short-term financial assets has been incredibly strong for many years (another way of saying that the market has been very risk averse for most of the past decade), and, moreover, the Fed hasn't artificially depressed interest rates, nor has it flooded the market with money no one wanted. The Fed has kept rates low because the demand for money has been strong. See this post (The Fed is not "printing money") from five years ago for more background.

Chart #2 actually has two messages: 1) an inverted yield curve is a good leading indicator of a recession, and 2) very high real short-term interest rates are also a good leading indicator of a recession. When both those conditions hold, that's when you need to worry about a recession. Today we're not even close to having to worry. Despite the Fed having raised its target funds rate six times in the past 18 months (from 0.25% to today's 1.75%), the real funds rate is still in negative territory (-0.18% as of March 31 by my calculations), because inflation over the past year has been almost 2%. The Fed has raised its target for the real funds rate because the market has grown less risk-averse and economic growth expectations have improved somewhat. The Fed hasn't "tightened" in the sense that it is trying to slow things down. The Fed is just following the market.

Chart #3

Chart #3 is important because it gives us information about the slope of the real, inflation-adjusted yield curve. Real yields are just as important, if not more so, than nominal yields. The blue line, the real funds rate, is ground zero for the real yield curve, while the red line, the real yield on 5-yr TIPS, is the market's estimate for what the real Fed funds rate will average over the next 5 years. Today, the front end of the real yield curve is positively sloped (i.e., the spread between the two lines is positive), and it has actually been steepening since last summer. The message: the market agrees with the Fed that short-term interest rates, in real terms, will need to rise in coming years. Not by a whole lot, but by enough to rule out the notion that the market and/or the Fed are nervous about the health of the economy. The time to worry is when the real yield curve becomes negatively-sloped, as happened before each of the past two recessions (i.e., when the blue line exceeds the red line, because that means the Fed has tightened too much).

Another reason the Fed needs to raise real rates is to boost the attractiveness of the $2 trillion of excess bank reserves held by the banking system. Failing to do so would decrease banks' desire to hold excess reserves, and that in turn would lead to excessive lending, too much money, a weaker dollar, and rising inflation.

Chart #4

Chart #5

Chart #4 uses real and nominal 5-yr yields to give us information about the market's inflation expectations. Despite the Fed having kept real short rates negative for 10 years, inflation expectations today are no different from what they have been in the past. As Chart #5 shows, the CPI ex-energy has been on a 2% growth path for the past 15 years, and inflation expectations today, based on 5-yr TIPS and Treasury yields, are about 2.1%. That is effectively proof that the Fed has not been printing money or distorting markets. In monetarist parlance, the Fed has managed to keep the supply of money pretty much in line with the demand for money, though not completely, because inflation has averaged about 1.6% per year for the past 10 years.

Chart #6

Chart #6 shows that real yields on TIPS also provide us with information about the market's GDP growth expectations. The level of real yields tends to track the level of real growth, and that is not surprising at all. A stronger economy implies higher real returns, and real yields should therefore rise in a faster-growing economy. Conversely, as economic growth weakens, as it did following 2000, real yields should fall. Currently, real yields of about 0.5% on 5-yr TIPS tell us that the market expects the economy is likely to grow about 2-2.5% per year, according to my reading of the bond market tea leaves.

If last year's tax reform results in a significant increase in economic growth, as I expect it will, then the Fed is going to have to guide real yields significantly higher as well. And that of course means significantly higher nominal yields, assuming inflation expectations remain "contained."

But for the time being, today's yield curve holds no threatening messages for the economy, and I think the market intuitively understands this.

What's worrisome today is not the yield curve, but the threat of a possible trade war with China and the ongoing tensions in the Middle East. The volatility that we are seeing is the result of the turbulence one would expect when headwinds (trade war risk, Middle East tensions) collide with tailwinds (last year's tax reform). For now, the market's judgment is that the two opposing forces effectively neutralize each other, with the result that growth is expected to be unimpressive, while inflation is expected to remain in the neighborhood of 2%.