What Could Weaken Strong Credit

Our Chief Fixed Income Strategist Vishy Tirupattur explains why credit markets have held firm amid macro volatility, and the scenarios which could hurt its strong foundation.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I am Vishy Tirupattur, Morgan Stanley’s Chief Fixed Income Strategist. Today, I will talk about why credit markets have been resilient even as other markets have been volatile – and market implications going forward. 

It's Tuesday, March 18th, at 11 am in New York. 

Market sentiment has shifted quickly from post-election euphoria and animal spirits to increasingly growing concern about downside risks to the U.S. economy, driven by ongoing policy uncertainty and a spate of uninspiring soft data. However, signaling from different markets has not been uniform. 

For example, after reaching an all-time high just a few weeks ago, the S&P 500 index has given up all of its gains since the election and then some. Treasury yields have also yo-yoed, from a 40-basis points selloff to a 60+ basis points rally. Yet in the middle of this volatility in equities and rates, credit markets have barely budged. In other words, credit has been a low beta asset class so far. 

This resilience which resonates with our long-standing constructive view on credit has strong underpinnings. We had expected that many of the supporting factors from 2024 would continue – such as solid credit fundamentals, strong investor demand driven by elevated overall yields rather than the level of spreads. While we expected the economic growth in 2025 to slow somewhat, to about 2 per cent, we thought that would still be a robust level for credit investors. These expectations have largely played out until recently. While we maintain our overall positive stance on credit, some of the factors contributing to its resilience are changing, calling the persistence of credit’s low beta into question. 

While we did anticipate that sequencing and severity of policy would be key drivers of the economy and markets in 2025, growth constraining policies, especially tariffs, have come in faster and broader than what we had penciled in. Incorporating these policy signals, our U.S. economists have marked down real GDP growth to 1.5 per cent in 2025 and 1.2 per cent in 2026. 

From a credit perspective, we would highlight that our economists are not calling for a recession. Their growth expectations still leave us in territory we would deem credit friendly, although edging towards the bottom of our comfort zone. On the positive side of the ledger, cooling growth may also temper animal spirits and continue to constrain corporate debt supply, keeping market technicals supportive. Also, while treasury yields have rallied, overall yields are still at levels that sustain demand from yield-motivated buyers. 

That said, if growth concerns intensify from these levels, with weakness in soft data spreading notably to hard data, the probability of markets assigning above-average recession probabilities will increase. This could challenge credit’s low beta, that has prevailed so far, and the credit beta could increase on further drawdowns in risk assets. 

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