Stock and bond markets are telling very different stories about near-term risk.

Stock investors want earnings growth, profit margin expansion, and smart capital spending. Bond investors want their money back, without inflation redoing its value, and not much else.

But the two markets often look to each other for signals on the next big move, even if they're focused on different catalysts. They typically don't diverge much in their assessment of near-term risks.

Today's market, however, is different.

The stock market's go-to gauge of near-term volatility, the Cboe Global Markets' Cboe Volatility Index, is hovering near its lowest levels of the year. It's tumbled nearly 50% since concerns about the U.S.-Iran war -- and the resulting oil price spike -- peaked in late March.

The VIX was last quoted at 15.67 points, and has closed above of the 20-point mark -- a level typically associated with elevated, but not extreme, volatility -- on only three trading days in the past five months.

The bond market equivalent, the Merrill Lynch Options Volatility Estimate, tells a very different story. Better known a the MOVE Index, it's risen nearly 43% since the start of the year and is just a few ticks shy of its late-March high of 107.67 points.

Meanwhile, the gap between the two has widened to its largest since the Liberation Day tariff turmoil in April of last year.

"The gauge everyone consults for risk is measuring the market where, for the moment, there is very little of it," said Michael Gayed, portfolio manager of The Free Markets ETF. "While the market where the risk actually lives moves 40 basis points in a single month."

Stocks, of course, have resumed their late-spring rally, with the S&P 500 rising nearly 2% over the past month to a record closing high of 7818.93 points on Tuesday.

But the bond market remains in turmoil, with 10-year Treasury yields rising to their highest level since 2002 at 5.35% on Tuesday, up some 58 basis points over the past month. Longer dated 30-year bonds, meanwhile, have jumped 48 basis points to a mutidecade high of 5.723%.

Henry Allen, macro strategist at Deutsche Bank, says the volatility indexes are reflecting "two fundamentally different worlds."

"Over the last month, we've seen bond markets price in more inflation risk, more fiscal risk, and the risk of more restrictive policy rates," he said. "But equities have generally brushed this off," as they focus on the tech-led rally and the third-quarter earnings season.

"In essence, we're pricing the symptoms of a new regime (such as yields at multi-decade highs and wider sovereign bond spreads), without pricing the logical consequences" for other markets, he added.

Last week's trading action in the wake of the September jobs report seemed to underscore those two realities. Stocks powered higher after the softer-than-expected reading lowered Federal Reserve rate forecasts, but bond yields continued to rise nonetheless.

"Equities priced a Fed that cuts, [long dated bonds] priced a government that keeps borrowing, and the two trades now sit in the same portfolio pointing in opposite directions," said Gayed.

Earnings might tell us which direction the market will follow. LSEG data suggested third-quarter S&P 500 profits will rise more than 30% from last year to more than $770 billion, with a tally topping $800 billion expected over the three months ending in December.

Tech and the AI investment boom will drive nearly half of those gains, however, leaving the market increasingly reliant on just a few stocks to power its recent gains.

Oil prices are back on the rise, as well, thanks to renewed hostilities in the Gulf region that have lifted Brent crude back above $102 a barrel, adding to inflation pressures and Fed rate hike bets.

And broader risks from November's midterm elections, now less than a month away, shouldn't be ignored.

Those risks make for a "worrisome" reading of the widening gap between the MOVE and VIX indexes, according to Saxo Bank's investment and options strategist Koen Hoorelbeke.

"Historically the MOVE precedes the VIX, but it takes a bit of time before the equity markets realize it's not all roses and sunshine," he said. "So, I expect volatility to rise (which is usually not a good thing for equities) in the coming months."

The gap between the two has been a useful indicator of late, with widening gaps in 2022 preceding a 20% stock market decline linked to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the massive spike in global oil prices, as well as the 9% pullback linked to the regional banking crisis the following year.

"If there's a lot of uncertainty in fixed income, it tends to bleed into the equity market too," said Joe Mazzola, head trading and derivatives strategist at Schwab. "I wouldn't say it's a perfect indicator, but it needs to be seen as a tool in context with the broader market."

With risks piling up as year-end approaches, investors need to deploy as many tools as they can to manage risk.