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[Macroeconomic Survival Prologue] The Asset I Trusted Most Was the One I Understood Least

An investor reflecting on the role of bonds while passing through an uncertain market

Why bond losses were harder for me to accept

In 2022, every look at my account showed the same thing: stocks and bonds were falling together.

The decline in stocks was painful, but understandable. I had bought them knowing that volatility was the price of pursuing higher returns. What I could not easily accept was watching BND, LQD, and a Korean 30-year government bond ETF collapse at the same time.

Bonds were supposed to protect me at moments like this. I believed they would offset part of a stock-market decline and buy me time to wait for a recovery. In 2022, that relationship did not appear as I had expected.

More painful than the loss was realizing that I had called bonds “safe assets” without understanding how they worked. I had not distinguished what was safe, under which conditions, or how long I had to hold it for that safety to matter. I trusted the label bond and lowered my guard. The asset I considered safest was the one I understood least.

I wanted to send a paycheck to my future self

I bought bonds for more than cushioning a stock-market decline. One day I will leave the company, and the paycheck that arrives every month will stop. Public and private pensions may help, but once I begin drawing them for living expenses, the balance will gradually shrink. I want to keep investing throughout retirement. To do that, I need cash flow that lets me avoid selling stocks at distressed prices during a bad market.

SCHD's dividends could form one part of that system. But entrusting my entire future paycheck to equity dividends did not feel comfortable. If I also owned assets that continued to pay contractual interest while corporate earnings and stock prices were under pressure, my retired self might be able to wait a little longer.

To me, bonds were a way to send today's money across time and deliver it to my future self after my salary disappeared. Their losses felt different from losses in stocks. A pillar I had built to protect my future was shaking.

Two investment journeys began at the same time

Reading Evolution of Investment alone might create the impression that I found VOO, SCHD, and SPMO first, then moved on to bonds. Real life did not unfold in such neat chapters.

From 2022 through 2025, I was gradually refining my equity ETF portfolio through VOO, SCHD, and SPMO. It was the period in which I learned to manage my own fear and greed through three exposures: the market, value, and momentum.

At the same time, a very different experiment was unfolding in the bond side of my account. I began with BND, LQD, and Korean 30-year government bonds, retreated into cash and ultra-short bonds, then extended duration again in anticipation of rate cuts. As my conviction grew, I reached for inflation-linked bonds, leverage, and eventually currencies.

These were two journeys running through the same calendar. Evolution of Investment looks at those years through equity ETFs and human psychology. Macroeconomic Survival follows bonds, interest rates, inflation, and exchange rates. In one account I was searching for rules that would keep my emotions from governing my decisions. In the other, I was trying to understand economic forces I could not control. The second journey led me into a more dangerous illusion.

The wish to understand tilted toward prediction

At first, I wanted to know why my bonds were falling. Studying created an appetite. I read every line of Federal Reserve statements, waited for inflation releases, and studied dot plots and employment reports. Understanding why rates were rising was no longer enough. I wanted to call the peak before everyone else.

If I could identify the next rate cut, I thought I could capture the rebound in long-duration bonds. Reading US interest rates together with the dollar and the yen seemed like a way to recover my losses and turn the macroeconomic cycle itself into profit.

A bond portfolio that had begun as a source of dependable cash flow slowly became a portfolio heavily dependent on the direction of interest rates.

That transformation is why I am writing this record. I failed to notice when studying the market had turned into confidence that I could predict it.

Getting the direction right was not enough

Macroeconomic Survival is a record of failure, not a story about correctly forecasting rates and currencies. The view that Korean growth would slow may eventually prove right. Central banks will also cut rates at some point. But identifying the final destination is not enough. How much further rates might rise, how far bond prices might fall, and whether I could endure the journey were separate questions. A portfolio needs a structure that can survive when its forecast is wrong or simply far too early.

To me, “Stay the Course” no longer means stubbornly holding the first product I bought. It means keeping sight of the purpose while admitting when a thesis is wrong and continuing to improve the way I travel.

The story begins in 2022, when I bought a 30-year Korean government bond ETF because I believed Korea's future growth rate would fall below that of the United States. The logic was persuasive, but the market was moving on a different clock from mine.

[Macroeconomic Survival Prologue] The Asset I Trusted Most Was the One I Understood Least ​

Why bond losses were harder for me to accept ​

I wanted to send a paycheck to my future self ​

Two investment journeys began at the same time ​

The wish to understand tilted toward prediction ​

Getting the direction right was not enough ​