Bond Investing Explained

A Beginner’s Guide to Fixed Income Strategies

Bonds provide stable income streams while stabilizing portfolios during stock market volatility. But picking the right bonds and funds take some education for beginners.

This guide serves as your primer on bond basics – how they work, different types, key metrics, risks and rewards, and portfolio strategies using fixed income. Let’s build up your bond knowledge.

What Are Bonds?

Bonds are debt instruments that governments and corporations issue to raise capital for projects, operations, or financing needs. The issuer pays back the principal amount borrowed plus interest by a set maturity date.

Key bond features include:

• Face value – Also called par value, this is the repayment amount at maturity, often $1,000.
• Coupon rate – Annual interest rate paid by the bond issuer, usually semiannually.
• Maturity – When full principal is due to be repaid, which ranges from 1-30 years typically.
• Yield – Annual return based on the bond’s current market price and coupon payments.

So in summary, bonds allow investors to loan money to issuers who promise repayment on a fixed schedule. The regular interest payments provide consistent income.

Why Invest in Bonds?

Here are the primary reasons to allocate capital to bonds:

• Income – Bonds generate predictable interest income at regular intervals. This provides cash flow for retirees or current spending needs.
• Diversification – Bond prices often rise when stocks decline, helping balance portfolios. This smoothes out returns over market cycles.
• Stability – Bonds offer relative stability of principal, especially for high quality bonds. This reduces portfolio volatility.
• Liquidity – The massive bond market provides easy tradability and conversion to cash when needed.
• Risk management – Conservative bonds help preserve capital closer to when funds are needed like in retirement.

Balancing a stock portfolio with bonds, whether owning individual bonds or funds, creates stability, diversification, and dry powder for buying stocks low when opportunities arise.

Types of Bonds

Many bond varieties exist, each with unique risk-return profiles:

U.S. Treasuries – Government bonds with extremely low default risk backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S.

Municipal Bonds – Issued by local governments to fund public projects. Interest is often exempt from federal taxes.

Corporate Bonds – Issued by companies and carry higher risk than government bonds. Credit ratings impact interest rates.

Agency Bonds – Issued by government sponsored agencies like Fannie Mae and offer quasi-government backing.

Senior Secured Bonds – Backed by designated collateral assets securing the bond. This elevates safety.

Junk Bonds – Below investment-grade corporate bonds paying higher yields due to increased risk of default.

International Bonds – Issued by foreign governments and corporations in their local currency. Add diversification but also currency risk.

Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS) – Interest and principal from pools of mortgage debt passed through to bond holders. Issued by agencies like Ginnie Mae.

Convertible Bonds – Corporate bonds that can be converted into common stock of the issuer at certain times during its life at predetermined prices.

Key Bond Metrics to Know

Some key metrics help in evaluating bonds:

Coupon Rate – Annual interest payment amount equal to the bond’s face value multiplied by the coupon rate.

Yield to Maturity – Total annual return anticipated on a bond held until maturity factoring in coupon payments and price change from par value.

Duration – Sensitivity of a bond’s price to interest rate changes. Longer duration means greater volatility.

Credit Rating – Rating agencies assess creditworthiness of issuers. AAA is pristine while junk bonds rate below BBB.

Bond Discounts/Premiums – Difference between the market price and par value. A discount means the bond trades below face value while a premium is above.

Research bond metrics like these to ascertain true risks and return potential.

Bond Market Risks

While generally safer than stocks, bonds carry unique risks to consider:

Interest Rate Risk – Rising rates lead to lower bond prices and vice versa since new bonds pay higher coupons. Longer maturity bonds see greater price volatility.

Inflation Risk – Inflation diminishes real purchasing power of fixed interest payments from bonds over time.

Call Risk – Some bonds allow issuers to “call” or redeem them before maturity once interest rates fall below coupon rate. This negates higher yield expectations.

Default Risk – Failure of the issuer to make interest or principal payments. Government and high-grade bonds have minimal default risk.

Liquidity Risk – The inability to readily sell bonds without discounting the price due to tight credit spreads. Liquidity shortages can spike this risk.

Balancing these risks against return prospects allows setting appropriate exposure to different bond types and managing portfolio volatility.

How Individual Bonds Work

Bonds can be purchased directly from the issuer upon release or from brokerages trading existing bonds. For example:

• Apple needs to raise $1 billion to build new headquarters and issues 10,000 bonds with a 5% coupon, $1,000 par value, and 5 year maturity.
• You buy one of these bonds for the $1,000 face value when issued.
• You receive $50 payments each year over 5 years (5% of $1,000)
• After 5 years, Apple repays your $1,000 principal.
• You earned 5% annual interest, or $250 total over 5 years plus your principal back.

Bond investors become creditors lending capital for the coupon payments and ultimate return of principal.

Bond Funds vs Individual Bonds

You can invest in bonds directly or through managed bond funds containing many bonds:

Bond Funds

• Afford diversification across many bonds
• Require lower minimum investments
• Offer daily liquidity and pricing
• Managed by professionals
• Charge annual expense fees

Individual Bonds

• Provide fixed income schedule and maturity
• Allow laddering maturities and yields
• Control over specific assets held
• Avoid annual fees of funds

Both provide fixed income. Individual bonds offer predictable schedules while funds provide simplicity. Blend where appropriate.

How to Evaluate Bond Funds

When analyzing bond funds, key aspects to evaluate include:

• Credit quality – Funds holding investment grade bonds have lower risk profiles than high yield.
• Average duration – Shorter is less sensitive to rate changes but has lower yields. Consider your risk tolerance.
• Average maturity – Similar to duration. Longer maturity reaches for higher yields.
• Fees – Compare expense ratios. Passive index funds charge lower fees than actively managed.
• Liquidity – Ability to efficiently buy and sell holdings. May be reduced in niche sectors.
• Yield – Generally higher yields compensate for higher risks.
• Fund size – Bigger funds may offer lower trading costs and better liquidity.

Picking the optimal bond funds aligns your risk appetite, return goals, time horizon, and cost preferences.

Passive Bond Investing Strategies

Those looking for a simpler approach to investing in bonds can utilize index funds and ETFs to diversify exposures and automate rebalancing.

Popular bond index funds track benchmarks like the:

• Bloomberg Barclays US Aggregate Bond Index
• Bloomberg Barclays Global Aggregate Bond Index
• Bloomberg US Corporate Bond Index

Asset allocation ETFs like those from iShares also offer balanced blends of stocks and bond index funds in one ticker.

These passive strategies provide low cost access to broad bond market performance.

Constructing a Bond Ladder

Bond laddering strategies invest in individual bonds with staggered maturity dates evenly over time. This provides consistent income and diversifies risks across duration and yield curves.

For example, you might build a 5-year laddered portfolio buying 1-year, 2-year, 3-year, 4-year, and 5-year Treasury bonds each year. As each bond matures, you reinvest the proceeds into a new 5-year bond to maintain the ladder.

Laddering smoothes interest rate changes over time and yields a regular income flow as bonds mature sequentially.

Bond Investing Tips

Some best practices when investing in bonds include:

• Match bond maturities to future cash flow needs like college or retirement. Longer maturities provide higher yields.
• Keep enough bonds maturing within 5 years for near-term income needs and to reinvest into higher future yields if rates rise.
• Limit exposure to long maturity bonds to contain interest rate risk in portfolios.
• Ensure adequate diversification across bond sectors, geographies, issuers, and credit qualities.
• Avoid reaching for yield with excessively risky bonds hoping to enhance returns.
• Manage allocations between government vs corporate bonds depending on risk tolerance.
• Review credit ratings downgrades promptly in case holdings slide into riskier territ