Following a string of weak auctions for U.S. Treasurys, investors are becoming increasingly concerned that the market will not be able to absorb an incoming influx of government debt, writes Eric Wallerstein for The Wall Street Journal.

A hotter-than-expected inflation report triggered a selloff that worsened last week, following weak demand for a $39 billion auction of 10-year Treasurys. Similarly, auctions for three-year and 30-year Treasurys saw lukewarm interest from investors.

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Behind the investors’ caution is a growing conviction that inflation has yet to be fully tamed and that the Federal Reserve will most likely leave interest rates at their current record highs for months or even years to come.

The 10-year yield — which is the benchmark for borrowing rates on mortgages, corporate loans, and everything in between — rounded out the second week of April at around 4.5 percent, which is close to the highest levels since reaching five percent in October.

Simultaneously, the government is preparing to sell an additional $386 billion or so of bonds next month, an onslaught that is expected to continue regardless of who wins the presidential election in November. Just from January through March, the U.S. sold $7.2 trillion of debt, which is the largest quarterly total on record.

While few believe a failed auction will happen, some think that other parts of the markets will be rattled by the glut of Treasurys, which could also raise the cost of government borrowing and harm the economy.

“There’s been a big shift in the market narrative,” said James St. Aubin, Chief Investment Officer at Sierra Mutual Funds. “The CPI [consumer-price index] report changed everybody’s view of where Fed policy is headed.”

Fred Hubler, the CEO and Chief Wealth Strategist at Creative Capital Wealth Management Group in Chester Springs, has long been concerned with government debt.

“We’ve been monitoring this, and it’s past being a hypothetical problem,” he said. “Even our own government has no plan to pay down the debt already borrowed and seems to have no interest in slowing down new borrowing. To that, add the powder keg that most Americans feel the money is being spent elsewhere and not addressing the problems here at home.”

Hubler noted that “the government has also become the biggest employer of new jobs based on some of the recent job reports. That is not what capitalism thrives on. But I remain optimistic that the entrepreneurial spirit of most Americans will get us to the other side.”

Read more about the concern over America’s bonds in The Wall Street Journal.