‘There’s no plan’: as instability in global bond markets rises, what are the knock-on effects?

Yields on US Treasury bonds and UK gilts recently hit their highest levels for decades. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

When Donald Trump was asked recently about the threat of rising interest rates on US government debt, he told baffled reporters: “The ultimate intervention is our military. And if we have to use that, we will.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, his bellicose words did not soothe fractious bond markets, and his resumption of the bombing campaign against Iran only made matters worse.