When treasury bond yields are rising, bond prices are falling. It’s an inverse relationship.
And so it makes sense that the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (NASDAQ:TLT) has fallen sharply during the Federal Reserve’s rate hike cycle.
“The Facts, Ma’am. Just the facts.” – Joe Friday
During the current rate hike cycle, the 10-year treasury bond yield has risen to over 4.4%! And this has put pressure on treasury bond prices.
Today’s chart takes a look at the performance of one of the largest and most popular bullish (long) treasury bond ETFs, the 20+ year ETF (TLT) versus its counterpart, the bearish (short) 20+ year treasury bond ETF (TBF).
As you can see, TBF (with only $198 million in assets) is up +51% over the past 2 years. In contrast, the much larger TLT (with $40 billion in assets) is down -39%.
Two Takeaways:
It would have paid to watch the trends and simply stay out of TLT over the past several months.
It also looks like the majority of the world (and $40 billion!) has been in the wrong bond fund for the past 2-years.