Episode 73: Bonds, Bots, and Base Rates: Where Yields Go Next

Feb 24, 2026

A rapid markets scan covering record bond issuance and shifting yield dynamics. Discussion of hyperscaler AI capex feeding bond supply and tech credit stresses. Views on where cash and long-duration bonds look inexpensive. Analysis of central bank moves, housing risks from higher rates, and whether AI will push inflation. Cross-asset tells from the dollar, gold and bitcoin for the year ahead.

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ADVICE

Reduce Leverage And Favor Senior Bonds

Delever and shift into senior paper when spreads compress and hybrid/subordinated spreads are extremely tight.
Coolabah sold hybrids and Tier 2s, increased senior bond weighting to ~70–80% and reduced leverage across strategies.

INSIGHT

Hyperscalers Are Remaking Bond Supply

Hyperscaler tech issuers are flooding bond markets with jumbo deals, changing index composition and supplying deep new issuance.
Examples include Google issuing across multiple currencies and a 100-year bond; tech weight in indices may rise from ~3% to ~20%.

INSIGHT

Hyperscalers Likely Understate Their CapEx

Hyperscalers may understate CapEx publicly as a strategic game to conceal true spending from rivals.
Coolabah mapped announced versus actual CapEx and found material understatements, with large CapEx upgrades evident in 2026.

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Welcome to the Complexity Premia podcast by Coolabah Capital, a hosted by Christopher Joye, Chief Investment Officer and Portfolio Manager at Coolabah Capital, and Ying Yi, a Senior Portfolio Management Director at Coolabah Capital. The Complexity Premia podcast strives to deconstruct modern investment problems for wholesale (not retail) participants in capital markets. You can listen on your favourite podcast app, or you can find it on Spotify, Podbean or Apple Podcasts.

In this episode, Chris and Ying Yi run a top-down markets scan: recent performance and the outlook for yields, how hyperscaler AI capex is feeding into bond supply, inflation expectations and term premia, and where value is emerging across major asset classes. They cover the next moves from the RBA and the Fed, implications for housing and growth, and whether AI ultimately proves disinflationary. The conversation closes with the cross-asset tells—USD, gold and bitcoin—and what they’re signalling for the year ahead.

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