The bond market threw a rod in the wake of the recent presidential election when a cool $1 trillion in value vaporized in a week.

Bond prices fall as yields rise, and rise they did after President-elect Donald Trump's election win. The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury bond spiked from 1.87 percent on Election Day to 2.34 percent by Nov. 15, which is where it stands currently.

To put this hissy fit in historical context, this was the sharpest upward move in bond yields in 15 years. I realize that a move of about a half percentage point might seem insignificant, but in the bond world such a move in a week is an earthquake.

The Wall Street cognoscenti attributed the surge in interest rates to two factors. First, Trump's plan to increase government spending on infrastructure and the military will add to the budget deficit and the bloated national debt.

The federal government will likely issue bonds to help pay for all these new roads, bridges, airports and airplanes. And issuing more bonds without sufficient investor demand would push bond yields higher.

Secondly, the new administration's pro-growth policies of lower taxes and reduced regulations will energize the moribund economy, but that could lead to a wicked spurt of inflation. Bond investors start chewing on the furniture at the mere mention of inflation because it makes their bonds less valuable.

Currently, the people selling bonds — so-called bond vigilantes — predict that inflation and bond yields will continue to move higher in the coming months. Several market experts have even sounded the death knell for the bull market in bonds.

In fact, legendary investor Bill Miller, chief investment officer at LMM in Baltimore, recently said this on CNBC: "In my opinion, the 35-year-old bond bull market is over." And that sentiment was echoed by economist Henry Kaufman and respected hedge fund manager Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Associates, one of the world's largest hedge funds.

A long run

Since 1981, the yield on 10-year Treasuries has fallen from 15 percent to below 2 percent, meaning prices have been rising for three decades — a heck of a bull market. Bond prices rise as yields fall.

Far be it from me to challenge the intellectual prowess and market savvy of those gentlemen, but such overwhelming consensus arouses my contrarian spirit. The vigilantes could be right. In fact, they probably are right, but allow me to present at least one countervailing point of view.

"I think the bond market sold off too much too quickly," said Jack McIntyre, portfolio manager at Brandywine Global in Philadelphia. "Bonds probably will continue to weaken here, but they can go sideways too, just like stocks have done for two years. I think bonds are going to do the same thing."

Perhaps his is the lone voice crying in the wilderness, but I get the heebie-jeebies when masses of investors are all heading in the same direction. There is this, too: I have lost count how many times in recent years that prognosticators have put forth ill-timed forecasts about interest rates and bond yields.

Forecasting the direction of interest rates is dicey at best, and economists never get it right. For example, in early 2014 a Bloomberg survey of 67 economists showed all of them predicting interest rates would rise that year.

There was not a single dissenting voice in the group. Well, in 2014 the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury bond dropped, from 2.73 percent to 2.26 percent.

Much the same thing happened in 2011 when the consensus was that rates would fall and the bond bull was kaput. The opposite occurred, with the yield on the 10-year bond dropping from 3.31 percent to 1.87 percent.

So here we go again with daily proclamations that the bond bull is near death — but maybe it isn't. Eventually, bond bears will be right, but I would submit that correct timing is as much about luck as skill.

Shorter maturities

In any case, bond investors should be cautious if inflation is in fact ready to howl. A good rule of thumb is that for every 1 percent increase in rates on a 10-year bond, the price drops 9 percent.

But the price drops less for shorter maturity bonds, which is the reason most financial advisers recommend shorter maturity bonds in the current environment. For example, the price of a bond maturing in five years will decline 5 percent if rates rise 1 percent.

It's easy to make the case that interest rates are destined to move higher, particularly since they have been hovering at record lows for months. But the powerful deflationary forces that pushed rates so low still remain.

McIntyre said globalization, technological advances and aging populations both here and abroad may counterbalance the forces of inflation. Baby boomers are retiring, which reduces the labor participation rate and curbs economic growth.

The point is that there are multiple moving parts in the debate over interest rates and inflation. Some of the best and brightest minds on Wall Street have jettisoned their bond holdings and encouraged others to do the same.

Perhaps that will turn out to be the best strategy to follow. But they have been so wrong for so long that I don't trust them anymore.