Ceasefire Pushes Rates Way Down; Will It Hold? Ask The Markets, NOT The Pundits

By Jay Voorhees

April 8, 2026 2 min read

Ceasefire Pushes Rates Way Down; Will It Hold? Ask The Markets, NOT The Pundits

It was an amazing thing to behold!

I watched the 10-Year Treasury yield fall almost 15 basis points or 0.15% (a huge drop) very quickly when the ceasefire was announced yesterday.

I also watched oil prices drop from $117 per barrel to only $92 per barrel – and I was gleeful.

But then I saw “Iran’s 10 Point Plan” (copied below) – and my heart sank.

I thought and still think … “NO WAY WILL THIS CEASEFIRE HOLD…given Iran’s demands.”

And sure enough, we’re still seeing missile and drone attacks as well as aerial bombings – justifying my concerns.

But, While Thousands of Pundits (Please See X) Seem to Agree With Me, the Markets Don’t!

Oil prices, while up a bit this morning from last night’s lows, are still around $95 per barrel (a whopping $22 per barrel lower than yesterday’s high).

And interest rates remain much lower as well.

Gold prices (analyst Brent Johnson’s favorite gauge of world turmoil) are up a little (1%ish), but still well below recent highs.

Note: I don’t use the stock market as a gauge because following it is like walking into a Las Vegas casino at 2 in the morning and asking drunken gamblers what they think about geopolitics.

My point once again is this. The pundits on either side of the argument are not good gauges of what will happen to Iran, oil prices, or interest rates.

But the gold, oil, and bond markets are.

This is because the thousands of investors trading in those markets have tremendous “skin in the game” with millions or even billions on the line.

The pundits, in contrast, only have their reputations on the line. And given how short memories are in this day and age of social media and lightning-fast news cycles, reputational risk for being wrong is often marginal and fleeting.

But losing a billion dollars lasts forever.

So yeah… the markets are telling us we can be optimistic – despite Iran’s demands and the continuing violence.