Interest rates have fallen this year because the otherwise compelling case for why they should rise was missing one crucial piece — until now. That missing piece was in the sentiment arena: Far from the excessive bullishness typically seen at market tops, bond traders and investors instead have been quite bearish. In classic contrarian fashion, the market instead did just the opposite — rallying as interest rates fell. But the Wall of Worry has now given way to near-record levels of bullishness. That’s not a good sign. Consider the average recommended bond market exposure among a subset of short-term bond market ... (full story)