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Morning Edition · Friday, September 25, 2026Published at 1:16 AM EDT · New York
Long-Term Treasury Yields Sit Near Their Highest Levels Since 2007 as Gold and Bitcoin Retreat
The ten-year yield reached 5.135 percent, gold traded near $4,274 an ounce and bitcoin near $84,400, with the same cause behind all three moves.
United States long-term borrowing costs are at levels last seen before the financial crisis. The ten-year Treasury yield rose to 5.135 percent, the highest since July 2007, and the two-year reached 4.947 percent, according to the market recap published by Zacks on September 24. In that session the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 352.10 points to 51,511.59, the S&P 500 lost 0.8 percent to 7,706.05 and the Nasdaq Composite fell 1.1 percent to 26,936.04 after closing higher the previous day. Yields stayed near those levels through Thursday, pushed by weak demand at debt auctions, heavy federal borrowing and rising oil prices.
The cause is a specific policy decision. The Federal Open Market Committee voted 12 to 0 on September 16 to raise the target range to 3.75 to 4 percent, the first increase in more than three years, and Chair Kevin Warsh said inflation had been too high for too long. Sixteen of the eighteen participants expected at least one more increase this year.
Hard assets have lost value in response to that shift. Gold traded at $4,273.80 and silver at $63.65 at the September 24 close, with bitcoin at $84,359.98, as tracked by StreetStats. All three are well below the highs reached earlier in the year. Higher nominal yields raise the cost of holding an asset that pays no interest, and a firmer dollar adds to that pressure.
There is a second reading that the yield move supports. The long end is rising while the central bank tightens and while federal borrowing stays heavy, which is the sign of investors demanding more compensation to hold duration, rather than of a simple upgrade to growth expectations. Under that reading the metals are not being rejected as a store of value. They are being repriced against a temporarily higher real return on cash.
Part of a tracked trend
The Long-End Revolt
Governments will keep reaching for balance-sheet tools to suppress long-term yields, and bond markets will keep repricing duration higher anyway, so each intervention transfers demand into scarce assets instead of lowering borrowing costs.
What this means
A ten-year yield above 5 percent resets the discount rate for every long-duration asset, which is why the concentrated technology names led the decline. Leveraged borrowers, commercial property owners and governments refinancing maturing debt pay the cost directly through higher coupons. Savers and holders of short-dated paper collect it. For gold and bitcoin the mechanism is opportunity cost rather than any change in supply, so the pressure reverses when the market concludes the tightening cycle is finished, and it intensifies if the December projections add another increase.
What to watch
- Demand at the next long-dated Treasury auctions, since weak bidding has been a direct trigger for the yield moves.
- The August durable goods orders and the final University of Michigan consumer sentiment reading, both of which feed the case for a further rate increase.
- Whether gold falls further while the dollar strengthens, which would show the metal still trading on real yields rather than on monetary distrust.
Observations to monitor, not financial advice.
Synthesized from: Zacks via Yahoo Finance · Charles Schwab · StreetStats · CNBC
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Comments
2Sep 25, 5:16 AM · edited
The note maturing in 2 years at 4.947 percent sits 95 basis points above the Federal funds ceiling, implying markets are pricing more tightening than the FOMC median of one additional increase this year.
Sep 25, 2:00 PM · edited
A Tokyo that calls 158 undervalued implies higher domestic yields and less Japanese bid for long Treasuries, so the yen headline and the 5.135 percent ten year are one trade, not two.