It now costs a whopping $500,000 a year to insure $10 million of Irish bonds for five years, according to data provider Markit, compared with around $460,000 on Wednesday evening. That’s a fresh all-time record and a 9% jump. And Ireland’s bond market isn’t faring better: Ireland now has to pay an interest rate that is nearly 4.2 percentage points higher than Germany, the euro-zone benchmark, to borrow cash from investors for 10 years. (That’s also a fresh record.) Two other fiscally-challenged European countries – Portugal and Greece – are also watching their risk spreads weaken, but not nearly as much.

So, what gives? Traders and economists have been saying for days that there is actually very little “liquidity” in the market for Irish bonds or credit-default swaps. Translation: Few investors are actually buying and selling insurance on Irish bonds, which means that when anyone does indeed buy, the price of insurance shoots higher. Brian Devine, an economist at NCB Stockbrokers in Dublin, put out a good note Wednesday explaining why Ireland’s credit spreads don’t reflect the country’s economic reality.