2011-02: Allocating Assets in Climates of Extreme Risk

As predatory financial markets dismembered Lehman Brothers in the autumn of 2008, panicked investors took refuge in US Treasuries. However, the rich returns to US sovereign bonds were not evenly distributed across the market. Prices of Treasury Inflation Protected Securities (TIPS), for which the principal and interest payments are indexed to the CPI, fell dramatically as their nominal counterparts rose in value. Near-term “breakeven” or “expected” inflation, which is the difference between nominal and real yields, plummeted to -6.5%. ¹