What are bear markets in bonds?

The first thing to understand is bear markets in bonds are nothing like bear markets in stocks. This is because bond returns are generally guided by math while stock market returns are guided by emotions. The best way to predict future returns in the bond market is to start with the current interest rate.

Why does our bond bear market look deeper than the 1970s?

On a tenor-by-tenor basis, our current bond bear market doesn’t look deeper than the 1970s in real terms for any individual tenor. We suspect the difference probably reflects a lengthening of the average maturity of US Treasuries in the BofA index, though without a specified index and a bit more work it’s hard to say.

Are We Ready to consign the 1970s to a bond bear market?

However, in real inflation-adjusted terms we cannot quite so ready consign the 1970s to the status of an also-ran bond bear market (although Bund-holders have not seen such real-terms losses for over 50 years, and real-term losses are getting close to 1970s magnitude for both Gilt and Treasury holders.