The Good News Is in the Fear Gauges
Start with what is not broken
High-yield credit spreads are 2.70% as of 2026-09-10. That is the 10th percentile of the roughly 3 years of history this site holds, against a record tight of 2.59% in the same window. Investment-grade spreads are 0.80%, the 24th percentile.
Jobless claims came in at 206k as of 2026-09-05. That is the 4th percentile of a series that runs back to 1967.
These are not sentiment surveys or analyst opinions. Both are measured outcomes: one is what investors charge to insure corporate debt, the other is how many people actually lost work last week.
The fear gauges agree
The VIX, which prices expected equity volatility, is 17.5 as of 2026-09-14, the 14th percentile of its 3yr range. The MOVE index, the equivalent for bonds, is 82.21 as of 2026-09-11, the 31st percentile.
Neither is at a record. Both are low. Taken together, the instruments whose entire job is to price fear are pricing very little of it.
Why that is genuinely remarkable
The long end of the Treasury curve is not calm. The 30yr yields 5.35% and the 10yr 4.96%, at the 98.6th and 100th percentiles of their 3yr ranges. WTI crude is 103.42 as of 2026-09-14, up 11.43 in a week.
So the economy is absorbing an oil shock and a long bond at the top of its 3yr range, and the credit market's answer is: we see almost nothing wrong.
Cheap money is not doing this. Money is expensive. That is the part worth sitting with.
The catch, which is the same number
A 10th percentile reading says 2 things at once. It says the market is calm, and it says there is almost no cushion left underneath it. Both are true of the same 2.70%.
When spreads are this tight, you are paid very little to take credit risk. The insurance is close to free only because nobody currently wants it. That is not a reason to be bearish. It is a reason to know exactly what you own and why.
One number for all of it
Pulling the 7 inputs together gives a single reading. This is the gauge, built in the site's own stripe geometry, refreshed on every rebuild:
How the gauge is built
7 inputs, equal weight, each expressed as a percentile of the history this site stores, roughly 3 years. Each carries its own as-of date, because some of these series publish with a lag.
The one rule that has to be right is polarity. A score of 100 means maximum greed, 0 means maximum fear. Price-like series (equities, Bitcoin) score high when they are high. Spreads and volatility score high when they are LOW, because tight credit and quiet volatility are what confidence looks like. Gold is inverted too, since a strong gold price is a fear bid. Getting that backwards silently turns a calm market into a panic.
Today the score is 73.9, which reads as greed. The dissent is gold, at 27.5. Everything else is calm; the haven bid is the one input still asking a question.
Where the bull case is honest
Equities are near records, not extended. The S&P is 7,656.98 as of 2026-09-11, up 11.6% year to date and 16.2% over 12 months, against an all-time high of 7,798.99. That is 1.8% off the peak.
Bitcoin is 77,743.65 as of 2026-09-14, up 23.5% over 30 days, and sits in the 52nd percentile of its 3yr range - mid-range, not euphoric.
And the honest part: this past week was red. The S&P fell 90.73, and our composite regime reads NEUTRAL at -0.003. The good news is not that everything is rising. It is that the system is carrying real weight without the plumbing creaking.
| TENOR | LEVEL | 1D Δ | Z (3Y) | RANGE %ILE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2Y | 4.610 | -0.060 | +1.39 | 78 |
| 5Y | 4.780 | -0.070 | +2.24 | 86 |
| 10Y | 4.980 | -0.070 | +2.51 | 84 |
| 30Y | 5.320 | -0.050 | +1.99 | 83 |
Why a 1% Rise Costs a 30-Year 15% — The mechanism behind a 5.35% long bond, worked through with no jargon.
Plumbing Became the Scarcity Trade — Wednesday 16 September 2026 — The Wednesday Scarcity follow-on: with the RRP buffer gone, the shock absorber is the thing in short supply, and risk appetite is priced at 73 of 100 with almost no cushion beneath it.