From Yield-Curve to Recession
This chart starts the clock at each sustained 10-year/2-year Treasury inversion and stops it at the next NBER recession. Historical waits ranged from 11 to 23 months in this small sample; the current episode is shown without declaring an outcome.
What does it show?
Five sustained historical inversions in this sample preceded recessions by 11–23 months; the 2022 inversion began 47 months ago without an NBER recession yet.
Methodology
Identifies monthly 10-year minus 2-year Treasury spread observations below zero, merges inversion runs separated by no more than three non-inverted months, retains cycles with at least five negative months, and measures from the first negative month to the next NBER recession start. Runs beginning inside a recession are excluded. This transparent rule reduces one-month noise but is an editorial definition; other maturities, daily data, thresholds, and episode rules produce different signals. The historical sample is small, recession dates are retrospective, and an inversion is not a deterministic forecast or evidence of causality.