Many individuals split their bond portion of their portfolio evenly
between nominal bonds and inflation - protected securities.
In thinking about choosing
between nominal bonds and TIPS, I have always found it helpful to think about the question in terms of Pascal's Wager.
Not exact matches
In contrast, medium - term inflation expectations implied by financial market prices, which are calculated as the difference
between nominal and indexed
bond yields, have been broadly stable at around 2.6 per cent over the past nine months.
Medium - term inflation expectations of financial market participants, as implied by the difference
between nominal and indexed
bond yields, have risen to around 3 per cent in October, from less than 2 per cent at the beginning of the year.
This important effect is the difference
between the «
nominal» return — the return a
bond or
bond fund provides on paper — and the «real,» or inflation - adjusted, return.
Breakeven rates — the difference in yields
between nominal and inflation - linked
bonds of the same maturity — reflect market expectations for inflation.
Expectations of inflation, as measured by the difference
between nominal and indexed 10 - year
bond yields, remain at around 2.3 per cent.
Despite the sharp rise in inflation expectations, 10 - year breakevens (the difference
between the yield on a
nominal fixed - rate
bond and the real yield on TIPS) remain depressed relative to their long - term history.
The difference
between nominal and inflation - protected
bonds show that implied inflation in Sweden is just 2 percent, while it's more than 3 percent in the UK.
Breakeven levels (the difference
between a yield of a
nominal bond and an inflation - linked
bond) are up over 40 basis points (bps, or 0.40 %) from the summer low and over 80 bps from the February nadir.
The spread
between the 10 - year
nominal bond and the 10 - year Treasury Inflation Protected
bond - the markets estimate of annual inflation over the period - is about 250 basis points, up 50 basis points from a year ago.
The current spread
between 10 - Yr
nominal Treasury
bonds and 10 - Yr Treasury inflation - protected
bonds is currently about 1.8 percent.
The breakeven inflation rate is the difference
between the yield of
nominal bonds and inflation - linked
bonds with similar maturities.
One way to analyze the relative value of inflation - linked
bonds versus
nominal bonds is to compare the implied break - evens priced
between the two against near - term inflation expectations.
The chart below shows the decline in the US Treasury yield over the last 21 years split
between the real yield, as estimated by the Bloomberg Barclays US Inflation Linked
Bonds Average Annual Yield, and the level of inflation expectations implied by the 10 - year
nominal Treasury
Bond yield.