TLT has been below its 200-day SMA for 85 days. The 5-year analog set.
TLT, the 20+ year Treasury ETF, closed today at $85.50 against a 200-day moving average of $87.98. That is a 2.81% gap, and it is the 85th consecutive trading day TLT has spent below its SMA200. This is now the fifth-longest below-streak the ETF has produced in the past five years.
Some people will read that and ask "is this the bottom?" That is not a question this site answers. The SMA200 framework is a trend filter, not a price target. What I can do is show what the framework currently says about TLT, lay out the recent analog set so you can calibrate expectations, and be honest about where the signal fails on bonds specifically.
The current state
The signal:
- Close: $85.50 (June 4, 2026)
- 200-day SMA: $87.98
- Distance: -2.81% (below)
- Below since: March 11, 2026
- Streak length: 85 trading days and counting
For the SMA200-as-trend-filter framework, the answer is the same as it has been since mid-March: TLT is in a long-term downtrend. The framework says you should be flat the position, not net long, until the close moves back above the line. That is not a prediction about whether TLT goes up tomorrow. It is a statement about which regime the price action is in, on the only timeframe the filter cares about.
The 5-year analog set
Below are every distinct below-SMA200 streak on TLT that lasted 30 or more days in the past five years:
| Start | End | Days |
|---|---|---|
| 2021-06-07 | 2023-03-17 | 648 |
| 2025-04-07 | 2025-09-05 | 151 |
| 2023-07-20 | 2023-12-14 | 147 |
| 2024-12-09 | 2025-04-04 | 116 |
| 2026-03-11 | (ongoing) | 85 |
| 2024-04-01 | 2024-06-04 | 64 |
| 2024-10-17 | 2024-11-29 | 43 |
| 2023-05-12 | 2023-06-21 | 40 |
A few things to take from that table.
First, the distribution is long-tailed. The shortest streak in the set is 40 days. The longest is 648, more than seven times longer than the second-longest. There is no "typical" below-SMA200 episode on TLT; there are short ones, and there is the 2022 bond bear which was its own structural regime. The current 85-day streak is somewhere in the middle of that distribution.
Second, four of the seven prior streaks resolved cleanly within 150 days. If you take 150 calendar days as a soft median for "non-regime-change" below-streaks on TLT, the current run is 85 days in. Plausibly we are more than halfway through if this resolves like a normal cycle. Plausibly we are still early if it does not. The framework does not let you tell which one in advance, and neither does anyone else.
Third, you cannot read 2022's 648-day streak as a precedent for normal behavior. That was a Fed-driven structural reset in long-rate expectations. Treating it as an analog for the current setup is a category error unless you have an independent thesis that something equally structural is in play. (Maybe you do. The framework does not require you to.)
Why TLT trips this filter more than QQQ does
Long Treasuries are the rare position where the SMA200 filter triggers fairly often even in non-crisis years. Equity ETFs spend most multi-year windows above the line; the SMA200 mostly exists to keep you out of the 2008s and 2020s. TLT spends a much larger fraction of any given five-year window below the line because long bonds have an entirely different return distribution from equities: lower compound drift, higher duration risk, and a multi-decade cycle that does not line up with the 200-day window.
That is not a failure of the filter. It is a feature of using a single trend lens across asset classes with different secular profiles. The same SMA200 rule that catches the 2022 NASDAQ bear at the right moment will whipsaw you in and out of TLT four times in a normal three-year window. The filter is doing exactly what it is designed to do; long bonds are just a much noisier substrate for it.
Two practical takeaways from that:
- If you treat TLT as a tactical position gated by SMA200, you should expect more frequent flat-and-back episodes than you would on SPY or QQQ. Plan for transaction costs and tax-lot headaches accordingly.
- If you treat TLT as a strategic allocation, the SMA200 is the wrong tool. You are making a different bet (duration in a portfolio context) and the filter does not speak to that.
This site is built around the first use case. If you are running the second one, your decisions live somewhere else.
What would resolve the current setup
Mechanically, for the streak to end, TLT's daily close has to print above its 200-day moving average. With the SMA currently at $87.98 and decaying as the 2025 strength rolls off the back of the window, the level needed for a flip would be somewhere around $87 in a few weeks, possibly lower by late summer. That is roughly a 2% to 4% move from current levels.
What matters for the framework is the close, not an intraday wick. Set the alert. Wait for the print.
What to watch
If you want to be alerted the moment TLT crosses back above its 200-day SMA, set a free per-ticker alert on TLT here. Whipsaw-protected so you only hear about real moves, not intraday noise.
If you want the cross of every major US ETF tracked daily in one place, the homepage is the live dashboard. Eight of the nine majors are currently above the line, and only TLT is below. That divergence itself is a setup worth understanding regardless of what you do with TLT specifically; equity trend strength concurrent with bond trend weakness is one of the cleaner macro setups the SMA200 framework picks up.
I have no view on whether long rates are about to roll over. The framework says be flat, the analog set says be patient, and the data says we are 85 days into a setup that historically resolves anywhere between 40 days and 22 months. Pick the part of that range you want to plan around and size accordingly.