The era of cheap money has come to an end. What does this mean for an investor
Global markets are entering a phase of nervous anticipation: money is getting more expensive, the directions of capital flows are changing, logistics is being rebuilt, and pressure on the dollar system is growing. Under these conditions, investors increasingly recall the pre-crisis year of 2007. For Russia, this means that even in conditions of formal isolation, capital remains vulnerable to global trends. Izvestia figured out how to save money in such an environment for a Russian investor: bet on bonds, dividend stocks, or go into protective assets.
How the availability of money is changing
Currently, the world is not living in a classical market cycle, but in a phase of structural restructuring of the global financial system. Currently, there is a liquidity squeeze — that is, a decrease in the amount of available money in the global economy. This is largely due to the fact that for decades the markets have been living on Japanese yen, which large funds, banks and hedge funds could borrow almost at zero. The Japanese currency was converted, for example, into dollars, which were used to buy American bonds with yields of 3-5%. Investors made money on the difference. When there are a lot of carry-on trading operations, a powerful inflow of capital into global assets is formed, which mitigates crises. The carry-on trade supported the financial markets of the USA, the EU, China, and Russia.
During a carry trade, large players usually use leverage: they borrow money, increase their position size, and turn a small bet difference into a significant return on equity.
In 2024-2025, Japan began a cycle of raising the key rate. Now it stands at 0.75%, which is the maximum in 30 years. According to the baseline forecasts, growth will continue to 1% in mid-2026. This is not much in absolute numbers, but it is essential for the architecture of the system.
As the market expects further rate increases, Japanese long-term bond yields are rising. Now it exceeds 2% for 10-year government bonds, although it used to strive for zero. At the same time, the yield on U.S. Treasuries is hovering around 4%. That is, the difference is about 2%. If you take into account currency hedging, fees and risks, profits almost disappear. As a result, large funds begin to close such deals — the bonds are sold, the money is converted back, returned to Japan and remains there. Liquidity is being squeezed.
Analysts predict that with a reduction in the Japanese flow of cheap money, some of the capital may flow to China instead of the United States and Europe, where investors are attracted by low inflation and a strengthening currency.
When the amount of available money is reduced, investors become more cautious — they buy less risky assets. Stocks are starting to fluctuate more. At the same time, loans are becoming more expensive. This does not necessarily lead to a crisis, but the living conditions for the markets are getting tougher. With falling demand for risk, commodity markets also fall, which means that exporters' incomes decrease. This directly concerns Russia — even if the country has limited access to Western capital markets, infrastructure, and depositories, prices for key goods are still formed globally.
The liquidity squeeze traditionally raises the demand for the dollar. Since the entire world is credited in the US currency, under stress, system participants urgently need to fulfill their obligations. Against this background, the dollar is strengthening, while the currencies of other countries are weakening. This makes servicing dollar debts even more expensive. In the classic scenario, oil often falls at such moments, or at least becomes extremely volatile — with the dollar rising, a barrel becomes more expensive for countries with other currencies, and demand cools. Even if a physical shortage of oil is already "on the horizon" (we wrote about this here), the market first of all overestimates the immediate demand.
The global liquidity squeeze leads to a strong dollar, investors leaving risky assets (in the risk-off mode they sell stocks, raw materials, currencies of developing countries and switch to the most reliable instruments), pressure on oil.
Treasuries, gold and logistics
At the same time, there is a gradual erosion of the dollar monopoly — the financial system is becoming less unipolar. This is clearly demonstrated by China, which is gradually reducing the share of US Treasury bonds to $683 billion at the end of 2025, from a peak of $1.3 trillion in 2013. At the same time, China remains one of the largest holders of American debt, but it sends a signal that it does not want to be completely dependent on someone else's financial infrastructure. After the freezing of Russia's reserves, this motive became even more obvious. All this reinforces the trend towards fragmentation of the financial system.
Diversification and increased caution against the background of sanctions and geopolitical tensions are also indicated by the fact that global central banks are increasing the share of gold as a protective asset that does not depend on someone else's jurisdiction. Recently, the total market value of gold in their reserves exceeded treasuries — this happened for the first time since the mid-1990s (Izvestia analyzed this moment in detail here). This is an indicator of the nervousness of the system.: it remains dollar-denominated, but the players are careful and create a safety cushion.
In this context, another layer appears — deglobalization and degradation of logistics: sanctions are applied, shipping is becoming more expensive, insurance and military risks are increasing, routes are lengthening. As a result, the goods cost more. This is a structural source of inflation — it occurs not because of overheating of demand, but because of rising costs, which are included in the price of goods. The trading system is going to undergo a long transformation.
For decades, the system has been based on globalization, the dollar, cheap loans, and logistics. And when cracks appear in it, the tension in the financing mechanisms increases, the same feeling arises — as before the crisis of 2008.
How can a Russian investor build a portfolio in these circumstances?
The domestic investor today lives between two risks: a squeeze in liquidity with a drop in commodity markets and a long-term structural shortage of resources with a possible price spike. The portfolio should be formed in such a way that it does not die in the first scenario and does not miss the second one.
The country has a high key rate, with annual inflation exceeding 6%. This cools consumer demand, puts pressure on mortgages, increases the burden on borrowers, increases the risk of delinquencies and worsens the prospects of companies that depend on lending. With economic growth of 1%, the economy is in a cooling state. The high key rate makes ruble-denominated bonds, especially OFZs, attractive. However, they are sensitive to inflation and budget risks. If global stress hits raw materials and the ruble, the pressure may return.
Shares of Russian companies are trading at low multiples, and this creates growth potential, especially if dividends are maintained. However, in the event of global financial stress, even cheap stocks may temporarily fall even more due to panic and reduced demand for risk. At the same time, the raw materials sector is both a source of short-term volatility and long-term strategic potential. Oil can be a reasonable long-term shortfall bet.
With the compression of global liquidity, demand for risk is falling, raw materials and markets in developing countries are sagging because investors are massively reducing positions, the Russian market may fall for the company: although the Russian Federation is isolated infrastructurally (access to instruments and markets is limited, which makes diversification difficult), it is not isolated from the global price economy. Raw materials, including oil and gas, are traded in the global system.
Taking into account all the factors, the portfolio holder should not bet on one scenario:
- If the horizon is short, stability is a priority. A significant share of OFZ, risk minimization, rejection of aggressive positions.
- If the horizon is average, you need a balanced design: part in bonds, part in dividend stocks of stable companies, a moderate share of commodity stories.
- If the horizon is long, stability is important. Bonds as an anchor, stocks as a source of growth and flow, the commodity block as a strategic bet on resource scarcity, gold as protection against systemic risks. Cryptocurrency is only as a peripheral element.
The investor does not need to guess which wave will come first, he needs to build a system that will survive both. Under current conditions, a reasonable portfolio structure looks like this. It makes sense to keep about a quarter of the capital in a protective circuit, primarily in physical gold and in a cash reserve with quick access. This is insurance against currency and systemic risks. About a third of the portfolio is in bonds, combining long—term issues with a fixed coupon and floating-rate securities to reduce the risk of an inflationary spike. About a quarter are in shares of large companies with stable cash flow and dividends, primarily in the commodity and financial sectors. The remaining part is flexibility: short—term instruments (short-term OFZ or bank deposits, money market funds) or small positions in riskier assets.
The theses contained in the text are not an investment recommendation, but the opinion of the editors.
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