When a bond's yield rises, its price falls — they move inversely. Long-dated bonds like the 30-year have high 'duration', meaning their prices are the most sensitive to yield changes, so a rate spike hurts long-bond holders most. Traders typically demand higher yields when they fear inflation (here from surging oil) because inflation erodes the value of the fixed coupons they'll receive years from now.

The yield curve plots yields across maturities. When long yields rise faster than short yields, the curve 'steepens'. Beginners can read a war-and-oil-driven long-end sell-off as investors pricing in more future inflation and a bigger 'term premium' (extra yield for locking money up longer), while the short end stays pinned by where they expect the central-bank policy rate to sit.

Global government bond markets tend to move together because they share the same big drivers — oil, inflation expectations and safe-asset flows. When Treasury yields spike on inflation fears, Bund and other euro-area yields usually follow (prices fall), because traders reprice the inflation outlook everywhere at once, not just in the US.

A credit spread is the extra yield a company pays over a same-maturity Treasury to compensate for default risk. Tight spreads (like 80bp) signal calm about corporate creditworthiness. When markets get scared, spreads usually 'widen' as investors demand more cushion; the fact they're holding here tells a beginner the stress so far is a rates/inflation story, not yet a credit-quality panic.

Gilts (UK government bonds) rarely swim against a global tide. When Treasuries and Bunds sell off on an oil-driven inflation scare, gilt prices typically fall and their yields rise too, because a higher oil price threatens UK inflation and makes the BoE's job harder. Remember the inverse: rising yields mean falling prices, and the longest-dated gilts (highest duration) move the most.