In short
Rubbish Talk rates Daily Mail Money's claim that today's gilt "spike" is "sending" UK borrowing costs to a 28-year high a 4/10, because the article's own text says the 30-year yield that hit that 1998-era level did so the previous day (Tuesday) and was "largely unchanged" on the day the headline describes.
The Verdict
Selective. The bond rout is real and the numbers are accurate, but the headline borrows yesterday's superlative to describe today's story. The 28-year high on the 30-year gilt was set on Tuesday; the article says that yield was flat this morning. The actual fresh news on publication day was the 10-year gilt reaching its highest since 2008, an 18-year high, a materially smaller milestone that never makes the headline.
What actually happened
A global bond selloff continued into a second day, pushing UK, US, German and Japanese long-term yields higher on inflation and rate-hike fears, alongside a spike in oil prices tied to US-Iran tensions. The UK's 30-year gilt yield had already surged to its highest level since 1998 on the Tuesday before publication; on the day this article was published, that yield was little changed while the 10-year gilt pushed to a fresh high, its highest since June 2008.
Key facts
- 10-year gilt yield: up 4 basis points to 5.268% on publication day, the highest since June 2008 (18-year high), per the article.
- 30-year gilt yield: "largely unchanged" on publication day; it "surged to a 28-year high" the previous day (Tuesday), per the article.
- Multiple outlets corroborate the Tuesday milestone: 30-year gilts were reported at "5.89%, highest since 1998" and 10-year at "5.25%" that day, per BigGo Finance and Yahoo Finance coverage of the same Tuesday move.
- US 10-year Treasury yield: near 4.8%, highest in about a year and a half, per the article.
- German 10-year yield: above 3.37%, highest since 2011, following eurozone inflation topping 3% in August, per the article.
- Japan 10-year yield: crossed 3% for the first time in three decades, per the article.
What to watch for
Watch whether the 10-year gilt's push to an 18-year high becomes the dominant storyline in follow-up coverage, or whether outlets keep recycling the more dramatic "1998" framing regardless of which maturity actually moved that day. Also watch the upcoming UK Budget: Peel Hunt's Kallum Pickering warned "there is no room for handouts", a signal that fiscal policy, not just global rates, will keep driving gilt-specific moves independent of the US/Japan/Germany selloff.
