Analysis Of The Fed's Testimony Yesterday -- SeekingAlpha Contributor -- March 19, 2021

SeekingAlpha contributor: the Fed may have just sealed the stock market's fate; link here;

The Fed gave the equity market exactly what it wanted, lower for as long as possible. Unfortunately, the bond market doesn't seem as pleased, which will be horrible news for the stock market. Rising rates are crushing growth and technology stocks, and soon the rest of the market will follow because there are very few if any "cheap" sectors left in the market.

In essence, the Fed will let the economy run hot, and the bond market does not seem the least bit comfortable with that. Rates are rising sharply on March 18, with the 10-Year now trading just under 1.75%. The curve continues to lift because the bond market fears that a hot economy could quickly overheat, causing prices to rise, and inflation becomes an issue.

It leaves the door open for the Fed to start having to taper its bond purchases and to raise rates much sooner than expected and potentially much faster than indicated. This is resulting in bond yields pushing higher. Additionally, there's a tremendous amount of debt coming to the market, with another round of fiscal stimulus passed, and more supply will need a lot more demand.

And then this:

While the news at first seems to be everything the stock market wants to hear, it's not good news. In fact, there was very little the Fed could have on March 17 to please both the stock and bond market. The Fed chose to placate the stock market. But stock prices are derived from interest rates, and as interest rates rise, stock prices need to reprice. They have been repricing and shall continue to reprice at lower levels.

The problem is that now, relative to the 10-year note, the S&P 500 has a valuation on par with the periods in January 2018 and October 2018. At no other time in modern history has the index been this expensive on a relative basis in this low-interest rate world. Everything changed in 2008 when we flipped from a high rate to a low rate world, so the period of 1999 would not be a fair comparison.

One last excerpt: 

From another angle, the S&P 500 dividend yield is currently around 1.44%, and it has only been lower one other period in time, at the turn of the century. And now, the 10-Year once again has a higher yield than the S&P 500. So will the 10-Year yield pull the S&P 500 dividend yield over time? It seems possible. Since 2010 the 10-year has traded with a premium over the S&P 500 dividend yield of 21 bps. It is currently 20 bps, which means that a movement high in the 10-year from this point is likely to result in the premium growing wider, or dragging the S&P 500 yield higher along with the 10-year.

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