The Incredible Shrinking Relative Float Of Treasury Bonds

Jon Economy

Via Global Macro Monitor blog,
Lots of hand wringing these days about the flattening yield curve. We still maintain our position that the signal from the bond market is significantly distorted due to the global central bank intervention (QE) into the bond markets. See here and here.
Most of what is happening with the U. S. yield curve is technical. Sure, traders can get a wild hair up their arse, believing the economy is slowing and try and game duration by punting in the cash or futures markets. Given the small relative float of the U. S. Treasury bond market, however, it doesn’t take much buying to move yields. In the words of economists, the supply curve of outstanding Treasuries is very inelastic.
This is illustrated in the following chart. The combined market cap of just Apple and Amazon at today’s close is larger than the entire the float of outstanding Treasury notes and bonds that mature from 2027-2027. We define float (US$1.16 trillion) as total Treasury securities (2027-2047) outstanding (US$1.73 trillion) less Fed holdings (US$575 billion).

This post was published at Zero Hedge on Jun 23, 2017.