Viewing profile — john2373

Is there a good link to learn more about that?

Thanks for the comment. I was trying to make clear this is a short-term strategy in a rising rate environment where you eventually want the principal back and don't want to take mu…

I added a note in my article to clarify this. My strategy here is short-term. You want to withdraw your capital eventually, not hold forever. Maybe you are saving for a house in a …

Cool. I will read that. I'm trying to address the practical case of buying something, earning interest, then selling it and/or having it mature, not holding into perpetuity. Maybe …

Automated CD ladders are great too. The only issues are if you need to liquidate in an emergency you take a bigger hit, and you owe state tax but in general they can be good enough…

> The mindset for rational and sane upward mobility seems to remain stubbornly out of reach, causing many honest, decent people to save up nest eggs which are then extremely vulner…

> Some firms offer target maturity bond funds which will is the best of both worlds. These are great for corporate bonds. Check out iShares iBonds if you want to include corporate …

In theory that's true if you hold the fund forever but take the example of VGSH from another comment thread. If you bought that fund exactly 1 year ago and sold today you would hav…

I am not sure if that's true for non-fixed-maturity funds because the fund manager will keep the ladder rolling after 5-7 years, ie. the fund won't just pay out at maturity - they …

Definitely a good alternative if your broker charges fees. As mentioned Fidelity does not but I suspect that's not the norm...

Yes, but the yield on the payouts is only around 2.5% with this fund so the price change has a massive effect on your overall return.

I mentioned it my post that and it's something to consider. With treasuries the spread is fairly tight.

I'm not sure that works universally. If you buy a bond with a 2% yield today that matures in 3 years and you decide to sell in 1 year instead and at that point the current rate is …

It depends. In my article I pointed out that with Fidelity there are no commissions or markups on treasuries on the secondary market. If there were, it would definitely change the …

You are correct in rising interest rate environments where you believe the rates will continue to rise. With bond funds you can get the same yield as the ladder (interest payments)…

What holding does is lock your returns and sets a floor. When you buy a bond and hold it you will be guaranteed to receive the return. Sure if rates rise afterwards you have opport…

I agree for long-term investments a fund might be better (ex. in a retirement account mixed with equity funds) but if you bought those bond funds in the past few years and sold the…

Thanks for the comment. I chose that picture more to capture the spirit of collaboration than to highlight specific code. We still have a lot of legacy code that we're constantly t…