Why is the bond market in rurmoil?

I keep reading articles about bonds without really understanding them. "Spiralling chaos from the bond market", we are told, "yields and bond prices move in inverse directions", "sharp increases in yields have produced losses for many fixed-income investors", "bond market fears are reaching fever pitch", yada yada.

Clearly, all this is a big deal for financial types, so I figure it behooves me to find out what it all means.

I mean, I get the basics: when you buy a bond you are making a loan to a company or government for a specific period of time, after which you expect to get your full principal back. The company or government can then use this money to fund projects, operations or infrastructure. In return, the company or government pays you iterest at a predetermined rate (the "coupon rate") every six months. It is thus a fixed income investment, much like a bank deposit.

Alternatively, you might look to sell the bonds before their natural expiry date, in which  you might get more or less than you originally invested, depending on how the market values that bond at the time. (You get to keep any interest earned to date of course.) So, you can look on a bond investment as pretty safe interest stream, or as a more speculative asset that might (or might not) appreciate in value.

After this, things get a little murkier. What affects the market value of a bond? The actual market price of a bond depend on the issuer's credit quality, the time left until maturity, and the interest rate it carries (compared to other interest rates in the market). 

But bond prices are also affected by changes in  interest rates in the market as a whole. When interest rates go up (e.g. when the central bank announces an increase in its index rate, such as at a time of high inflation),.bond prices tend to fall to equalize the bond's interest rate with the prevailing rates in the market. Conversely when general interest rates fall, bond prices in the market tend to rise. 

The coupon rate of a bond is also affected by the credit rating of the issuing.corporation or government, and the time to maturity. An issuer with a poor credit rating has a greater risk of default (i.e. not being able to pay back the principal at maturity), so it must attract investors with a higher coupon interest rate. Also, bonds with a long maturity date are more exposed to interest rate and inflation risks for an extended period, and so must offer a higher coupon rate to attract investors.

So, what is causing all the turmoil in today's bond market? In recent months, bond yields (basically the inteeat rates they offer) have been rising, which in turn pushed the price of bonds down. The increase in yields is a result of a whole complex cocktail of factors: strong economic growth expectations, high inflation worries (which causes investors to require their interest rates to compensate for their loss of purchasing power), high government borrowing, high funding levels for AI development (with all the uncertainty that entails), and general uncertainty about the rationality of the US government and the Federal Reserve's ability to function independently and rationally.

Almost all of this relates directly to the USA, but America's influence is so strong that is repercussions on the bond market are being felt worldwide.