BlackRock Long
Duration Bond Portfolio is changing its name on July 29, 2013, to BlackRock Investment Grade Bond Portfolio.
Of course, if you own a longer
duration bond portfolio these numbers will not look nearly as friendly.
So if an investor expects market interest rates to go down, they want a long -
duration bond portfolio because it will maximize the increase in price.
Not exact matches
But that total is dwarfed by the more than $ 1.5 trillion invested in intermediate - term
portfolios (3.5 - to six - year average
duration), which include core
bond funds hewing to the Bloomberg Barclays U.S. Aggregate index.
According to Morningstar Direct, $ 59 billion is invested in long - term
bond funds and exchange - traded funds (defined as
portfolios with average
durations above six years).
Funds that own high - quality
bonds with shorter
durations, such as Fidelity Short - Term
Bond, can help reduce your
portfolio's sensitivity to rising rates.
Government
bonds could help reduce default risk, but because of the length of maturity required to earn any meaningful yield, they do little to reduce
duration risk - i.e. the overall sensitivity of a
portfolio to interest rate rises.
Shorter
duration bonds, or
bonds that mature within three years, can potentially offer a
portfolio stability during market volatility.
The longer the
duration, the more sensitive a
bond portfolio is to interest rate changes, so HYGH's much shorter
duration is its protection against higher rates.
Fidelity's Julian Potenza seconded Darda's emphasis of muni
bonds, saying «investors should consider keeping the portion of their fixed - income
portfolio that is currently earmarked for liquidity relatively short, in terms of
duration.»
Since 2013, many investors have shunned this
bond index, believing the Agg's higher
duration or interest rate risk left
portfolios exposed to large losses if interest rates shot up.
Given those
durations, an investor with 15 - 20 years to invest could literally plow their entire
portfolio into stocks and long - term
bonds, in expectation of very high long - term returns, with the additional comfort that their financial security did not rely on the direction of the markets, thanks to the ability to reinvest generous coupon payments and dividends.
Duration, the most commonly used measure of
bond risk, quantifies the effect of changes in interest rates on the price of a
bond or
bond portfolio.
This could be a drag on current growth and cause risk - on / risk - off gyrations, making long -
duration bonds useful
portfolio diversifiers.
Short
duration bond funds can help you manage the impact of interest rate changes on your
portfolio.
In a rising rate environment, conventional wisdom says to shorten
duration in
bond portfolios.
Specifically, longer -
duration bonds are reasserting their role as an effective ballast to equity risk and can be especially helpful in equity - centric
portfolios.
Over the long term the nominal return on a
duration - managed
bond portfolio (or
bond index — the
duration on those doesn't change very much) converges on the starting yield.
Duration is a measurement of a
bond's — or a
portfolio's — sensitivity to interest - rate movements.
Generally, the higher the
duration, the more the price of the
bond (or the value of the
portfolio) will fall as rates rise because of the inverse relationship between
bond yield and price.
Our current
portfolio duration is driven by the prevailing Market Climate we observe (not by those views about the Fed), but we're comfortable with a fairly typical
duration here in
bonds.
While longer -
duration bonds can provide
portfolio diversification benefits, shortening the
duration of your
bond portfolio can potentially help manage losses due to rising interest rates.
Duration is a measure of a
bond portfolio's sensitivity to changing interest rates.
One term that
bond ETF investors must be familiar with as it relates to their
portfolio is: effective
duration.
Shortening the
duration of your
bond portfolio can potentially help manage losses due to rising interest rates.
Dave Nadig, CEO of ETF.com and a well - known ETF expert, recently suggested as much, noting that «
Duration hedging hasn't yet had its «hedge the yen» moment when investors discovered the power of currency hedging en masse, but like currency - hedged ETFs, duration - hedged ETFs may start finding a place not necessarily as core holdings, but as finely honed tools for tweaking duration exposure in a broader bond - portfolio context
Duration hedging hasn't yet had its «hedge the yen» moment when investors discovered the power of currency hedging en masse, but like currency - hedged ETFs,
duration - hedged ETFs may start finding a place not necessarily as core holdings, but as finely honed tools for tweaking duration exposure in a broader bond - portfolio context
duration - hedged ETFs may start finding a place not necessarily as core holdings, but as finely honed tools for tweaking
duration exposure in a broader bond - portfolio context
duration exposure in a broader
bond -
portfolio context.»
In
bonds, the recent rally in straight
bonds provides a reasonable opportunity to reduce
portfolio duration.
Other factors also impact
portfolio performance; most notably, the specific market segments in which it is invested —
durations of junk
bond funds will exceed
durations of treasury funds with similar maturities.
The idea being that your
bond portfolio will have recovered a loss in value if you hold it for the
duration.
«If you're referring to the Slow & Steady
portfolio then I'm fine with the regular
bond fund as its
duration is below the
portfolio's time horizon» TA
Former Fed Governor Stein highlighted that Federal Reserve's monetary policy transmission mechanism works through the «recruitment channel,» in such way that investors are «enlisted» to achieve central bank objectives by taking higher credit risks, or to rebalance
portfolio by buying longer - term
bonds (thus taking on higher
duration risk) to seek higher yield when faced with diminished returns from safe assets.
(
Duration could apply to a
bond fund, a
bond, or a
portfolio of
bonds).
@Matt — I should leave @TA to comment on his article when he gets a chance, but just quickly the regular Vanguard
bond fund in the Slow and Steady
portfolio has a
duration of 12.3 years versus the index - linked fund's much greater 23.1 year
duration.
Shorter ‐
duration bonds do not provide the same degree of
portfolio diversification as longer ‐
duration bonds.
So we would estimate a 40-30-30 % mix of stocks,
bonds, and cash to have an overall
portfolio duration of about 22 years here.
With stocks on shaky ground, investors with equity - centric
portfolios may want to consider adding exposure to longer -
duration bonds.
High Quality, Long
Duration Bonds Perform Well When Times Get Tough Can we improve upon this
portfolio construction?
We are experienced providing
duration matching
portfolios with high levels of precision, while also determining the appropriate level of credit risk necessary to generate incremental returns relative government
bond portfolio alternatives.
Investors use
duration to measure the volatility of the
bond or a
bond portfolio.
They evaluate factor
portfolio performance based on excess return of constituent corporate
bonds versus
duration - matched U.S. Treasuries (thereby focusing on the default premium component of corporate
bond returns).
A long
duration fund should be composed of a diversified
portfolio of investment grade
bonds and have a long
duration.
The
duration of our
bond portfolio remains relatively short as a means designed to protect against rising interest rates.
This lowering of yields has exacerbated another challenge that already existed for traditional
bond portfolios: the spread between
duration and yield, which exacerbates interest rate risk.
The point is that, when including the G Fund,
duration can be increased in the
bond portfolio for a greater expected return yet with similar volatility.
The longer the
duration or maturity of the
bonds in the
portfolio, the more committed the managers are to those
bonds.
Other specialty
portfolios include Short Term and Floating Rate
Bonds, Inflation - Linked
Bonds, Bank Loans, Infrastructure Debt, and Long
Duration Credit.
Fairly conservative investors favor short - term
bond funds because they're less sensitive to interest rates than
portfolios with longer
durations.
With an attractive yield advantage over comparable maturity government
bond mutual funds of similar
duration and quality, the Fund may serve as a core holding for building diversified income
portfolios.
Duration is a quantifiable measurement of
bond sensitivity to changes in interest rates: if they change by 1 %, how much will the price of the underlying
bond, or
portfolio of
bonds, likely change.
If you fear rising interest rates, the prudent strategy is to reduce the
duration of your
bond portfolio.