Bond markets grow weary of tired deficit playbook
TLT•Bond markets and the US Treasury's deficit response
Amid a global government debt sell-off, the US Treasury is mashing together its favorite ideas for supposed fiscal rectitude. Withholding social funds to fight "fraud," upping tariffs and hoping for faster growth are meager responses to a $2 trln shortfall and 2007-style yields.
Context on global yields and recent US policy comments
Global bond yields traded at multiyear highs on September 1 as finance leaders from the Group of 20 gathered in Asheville, North Carolina for a ministerial meeting.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a CNBC interview on August 21 that there's a "very good chance" the federal deficit has peaked and that "several hundred billion dollars" could be saved by cutting waste, fraud and abuse from government spending.
The United States on July 24 imposed new tariffs of 10% and 12.5% on goods from 60 trading partners, including the EU and China, alleging those countries failed to curb imports made by forced labor, just as a temporary 10% global tariff expired.
