Since 1968, the US economy has endured seven recessions and Australia has followed suit in six of these, where each was preceded by an inversion of the US government 10-year yield curve.

Yield curve inversion simply refers to the scenario whereby long-term debt instruments – such that US 10-year bonds represent – begin to display a lower yield than short-term debt instruments of the same credit quality, which, for US observers, has often been US three-month or two-year government treasuries.