2029: The Bond Market Explained: What It Means For Your Money

**Farnoosh Torabi** (0:00)
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**SPEAKER_2** (0:36)
You're listening to So Money with award-winning money guru Farnoosh Torabi.
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**Robin Wigglesworth** (1:03)
I think it's massively overdue that you do a Bond episode because bonds are, despite their reputation, incredibly exciting and interesting. But the reason why I wrote an entire book about it is because they're also enormously, fantastically important. The stock market gets all the attention. That's what you see on CNBC. That's what I spend a lot of my time reporting on as well. But the bond market is like the bedrock that the entire house rests upon.
They're quite often that role in a person's personal portfolio as well.

**Farnoosh Torabi** (1:36)
Welcome to So Money, everyone. I'm Farnoosh Torabi. If you've been following financial news lately, you may have noticed something unusual. The bond market is getting a lot of attention. After a year of tariff shocks, interest rate whiplash, tax policy changes and persistent questions about inflation and the national debt, bonds have moved from the financial pages into the broader economic conversation. So today's show is about understanding bonds a little better. And I got to admit, after more than a decade of hosting the show, I don't think we've ever dedicated a full episode to bonds. We're going to fix that today. And I couldn't think of a better guest. Robin Wigglesworth is a financial journalist who's been covering these markets up close for years. He's an editor at the Financial Times where he leads FT Alphaville, its influential markets and finance blog. He's also the author of Trillions, his acclaimed history of the index fund revolution and the rise of passive investing. He has a new book coming out in September called A Fabulous Debt, the epic story of how bonds built the modern world. This is not a book about how to build a bond portfolio. It's essentially a people's history of the bond market, beginning in Venice in 1171 It also brings us to America and Alexander Hamilton. We talk about what the 10-year treasury yield can tell us about the economy, why it matters more to mortgage rates than many people realize. We also discuss this country's nearly 40 trillion national debt and the big question, at what point does all of this borrowing become a problem?
Here's my Commercy. Here's Robin Wigglesworth.
Robin Wigglesworth, welcome to So Money.

**Robin Wigglesworth** (3:18)
Well, I'm very happy to be here, so thanks for having me on.

**Farnoosh Torabi** (3:21)
Well, I have to say, having this show 11 years, I don't think I've ever done an exclusive episode on the topic of bonds. We certainly talk about them, but to really dedicate an episode, and you went so far as to dedicate an entire book to this issue.
Your book is called A Fabulous Debt, The Epic Story of How Bonds Built the Modern World. What made you want to spend your life, part of it at least, writing the biography to bonds, Robin?

**Robin Wigglesworth** (3:52)
Well, I think it's massively overdue that you do a bond episode, because bonds are, despite their reputation, incredibly exciting and interesting. But the reason why I wrote an entire book about it is because they're also enormously, fantastically important. The stock market gets all the attention. That's what you see on CNBC. That's what I spend a lot of my time reporting on as well. But the bond market is kind of like the bedrock that the entire house rests upon.
They're quite often that role in a person's personal portfolio as well. But I think people don't always think about how essential they are to the entire financial system and how it's ordered. It really is the bedrock. It's what everything rests upon. And the bond market, it's kind of like one of the first financial innovations, the first fintech as it were, and has shaped the world as we know it in myriad ways. And I knew a little bit about the history because I write a lot about bonds as a financial journalist. But the more I dug into its history to try and understand it, the more I realized that, wow, this was just an incredible story.