Gold Glimmers as the Pool of Negative-Yielding Debt Surges

Gold Glimmers as the Pool of Negative-Yielding Debt Surges

It’s been a tragic week, to say the least. It began with a fluke Ethiopian Airlines crash, which led to the grounding of all Boeing 737 MAX 8 jets worldwide, and ended with a hateful terrorist attack in Christchurch, New Zealand. On behalf of everyone at U.S. Global Investors, I want to extend my deepest sympathies to all those who were affected.

I’ll have more to say on airlines in a moment.

For now, I want to share with you a tweet by Lisa Abramowicz, a reporter for Bloomberg Radio and TV who often comments on the “fear” market.

“The pool of negative yielding debt has risen to a new post-2017 high of $9.2 trillion,” she writes. “Mind boggling at a time when the global economy is supposedly still recovering.”

Since Lisa tweeted this on Wednesday, the value of negative-yielding bonds has ticked up even more, to $9.32 trillion. This is still below the 2016 high of $12.2 trillion, but, as Lisa said, mind-boggling nonetheless. It also indicates that investors fear global economic growth is slowing.

The Pool of Negative-Yielding Bonds Has Climbed to a New High
click to enlarge

The yield on Japan’s 10-year government bond is back in negative territory, trading at negative 3 basis points (bps) today, while Germany’s was trading at a low, low 8 bps.

As I’ve explained to you before, low to negative-yielding debt has historically been constructive for gold prices. The yellow metal doesn’t have a yield, but in the past it’s been a tried-and-true store of value when other safe haven assets, such as government bonds, stopped paying you anything. In the case of Japanese bonds right now, investors are actually paying the government—and that’s before you factor in inflation.

This is just one of many reasons why I recommend a 10 percent weighting in gold, with 5 percent in physical bullion and jewelry, the other 5 percent in high-quality gold stocks and funds. Remember to rebalance at least once a year.