Global bond yields hit their highest in 18 years

Good afternoon, friends. September is off to a rather busy start, between renewed fighting between Iran and … everyone … and money getting more expensive everywhere on the planet at more or less the same moment.

Global bond yields are at their highest since mid-2008 — and the freshest trigger sits close to home. A Bloomberg gauge of global government debt rose for a fourth straight day on Monday, hitting 3.7%, the highest since mid-2008 — and pushing the 10-year US Treasury yield to its highest since January 2025. Japan’s 10-year bond crossed 3% for the first time since 1996, while Australia’s benchmark hit levels last seen in 2011.

Two forces are pushing in the same direction: Fed Chair Kevin Warsh doubling down on rate-hike rhetoric at Jackson Hole, plus fresh US-Iran hostilities stoking fears of prolonged disruption through the Strait of Hormuz — the chokepoint for roughly a fifth of the world’s oil — which has pushed crude and inflation expectations higher together.

Speaking of which: Brent held above USD 90 for a second day, currently sitting just shy of USD 95 per barrel, while WTI rose 0.9% to USD 86.50.

Meanwhile, new paperwork requirements for investment firms in the US are designed to separate grown-ups from tourists. The SEC is pressing investment firms to prove they actually have access to shares in hot private startups, the WSJ reports — scrutiny aimed squarely at the SPV managers selling indirect exposure to OpenAI and Anthropic after both labs disowned SPV-based share transfers outright.

Note who this doesn’t touch: Abu Dhabi’s MGX and Qatar’s QIA each hold direct primary stakes in those names. The distinction the SEC is now enforcing — real equity versus a promise of it — is precisely the one that has kept our two biggest sovereign AI positions clean while the market around them turned murky. –Salma