Quarter-End, and the Long End Is Steep Everywhere
H1 2026 closes with a fat US long end — and a look across the developed world says it isn't ours alone.
The tape — The first half closes today, and the US long end caught a modest bid into the print — 20-year-plus Treasuries up about a tenth of a percent. Read that as quarter-end index extension, not a turn: the duration demand that shows up every quarter-end, nothing more. The curve still sits exactly where the franchise left it — the 30-year at 4.88%, 2s30s near 76bp, a long end that won't flatten.
Credit went in firm — Credit headed into the quarter-end markup firm. Investment-grade broad OAS sits near 77 basis points, high yield near 283, with high yield outperforming on the day — HYG up 0.23%, high-yield yields a touch lower, even CCC tighter. Risk-on, exuberance headlines, the works. Nothing in spreads is flashing; the long-end story remains a rates and term-premium story, not a credit one.
The global tell — Step back to the global board and the real point lands: the steep long end is not a US quirk. The 30s10s slope is positive and wide across the developed world.
Japan runs the steepest near 126bp, France 91, Italy 86, the UK 71 — and the US sits mid-pack near 49, alongside Germany, China, and Canada. Different central banks, different politics, the same shape. Every developed long end is demanding term premium at once — and the US, far from the outlier the domestic narrative implies, is squarely in the middle of the pack.
The why, and the setup — The driver rhymes everywhere: large fiscal supply, a central bank that no longer anchors the long end, and inflation that won't fully behave. The US version has a name — the naked long end, post-Warsh — but the phenomenon is global. When the entire developed world re-prices term premium together, that is not a story about one Fed chair. It is the market re-learning that duration carries a cost.
Into the back half: jobs data Thursday, ahead of the July 4 close, against hot retail sales near 7% and CPI still at 4.2%. The hawkish-hold frame holds. The front end stays pinned to a 3.75% policy rate; the action, as it has been all year, is in the term premium — not the path.
The Bond Bro is published by [Positive Carry LLC] and is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not investment, legal, or tax advice, nor an offer, solicitation, or recommendation to buy or sell any security or instrument. Nothing here is individualized to any reader's circumstances or objectives. Data is sourced from third parties believed reliable but is not guaranteed for accuracy or completeness; figures are as of the time noted and subject to change. Forward-looking views are opinions, not forecasts, and may not occur. The author and/or affiliates may hold positions in securities or instruments mentioned. Rich Petruzzo, CFA. © 2026.