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What capital actually earns

Headline yields are quoted before inflation, which is not what you keep. The US Treasury publishes both nominal and inflation-protected yields, and the gap between them is the inflation rate the market is pricing right now — not a forecast, a traded price.

U.S. Department of the Treasury

Data as of 10 Aug 2026

Verified 11 Aug, 16:11 UTC

US 10Y nominal

4.72%

What it says on the tin

US 10Y real

2.43%

What you actually keep

Market-implied inflation

2.29%

Our calculation: nominal less real

5-year real

2.16%

Shorter horizon, after inflation

30-year real

3.00%

The long end, after inflation

Cash at 1%, real

-1.26%

A typical instant-access account today

What a return is really worth

Inflation starts at the rate the market is currently pricing

Amount

Nominal return · 4.72%

Inflation · 2.29%

Starts at 2.29%, the rate currently implied by the gap between nominal Treasuries and TIPS.

Horizon · 10 years

Value after 10 years

$158,597

Before adjusting for inflation

Worth in today’s money

$126,463

↑ Genuine gain in purchasing power

Real rate of return+2.38%

Lost to inflation$32,134

Years to double in real terms30

Compounding is annual and assumes the rate holds for the whole period. Tax, fees and reinvestment are not modelled. Real values use the Fisher relation rather than simply subtracting inflation, which matters at higher rates.

Nominal against real across the curve

The distance between the lines is what inflation is expected to take

Nominal yield
Real yield after inflation

Implied inflation

10-year break-even, past year

26-01-0226-03-1726-05-2826-08-10

The gap between nominal and inflation-protected ten-year yields, day by day. Because both are traded continuously, this is a live price on future inflation rather than a backward-looking statistic.

Every inflation-protected maturity

Nominal, real, and the gap

Maturity	Nominal	Real	Implied inflation	Doubles money in	Doubles purchasing power in
5Y	4.41%	2.16%	2.25%	16 years	32 years
7Y	4.56%	2.28%	2.28%	16 years	31 years
10Y	4.72%	2.43%	2.29%	15 years	29 years
20Y	5.25%	2.79%	2.46%	14 years	25 years
30Y	5.25%	3.00%	2.25%	14 years	23 years

Nominal and real yields are published by the Treasury. Implied inflation and the doubling times are our own arithmetic on the two published series.

US 10-year real yield

Past year

26-01-0226-03-1726-05-2826-08-10

Below the dashed line, lending to the US government for ten years loses purchasing power even if every payment is made in full.

Why this is the number that matters

A savings account paying 3% while inflation runs at 4% loses money every year, slowly and invisibly. The statement goes up; what it buys goes down. Real return is the only figure that says whether you are getting richer.

Most sources quote inflation from a consumer price index, which describes what already happened, often with a month or more of lag. The figure used here is the difference between what investors accept on ordinary Treasuries and on inflation-protected ones, which updates every business day.

It is not a perfect measure. It carries a small premium for the insurance value of inflation protection and for differences in liquidity between the two markets. But it is a price rather than a statistic.