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| Preface | |
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| Acknowledgments | |
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| The Basic Basics | |
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| The Life of a Bond | |
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| First, What Is a Bond? | |
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| How Bonds Are Issued and Traded | |
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| Key Terms for Bonds | |
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| The Bond Market: An Overview | |
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| The Bond Market: An Overview | |
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| Bond Pricing: Markups and Commissions | |
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| How Bonds Are Sold: Dealers, Brokers, and Electronic Platforms | |
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| Terms Used in Buying, Selling, and Discussing Bonds | |
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| Volatility: Why Bond Prices Go Up and Down | |
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| Interest Rate Risk, or a Tale of Principal Risk | |
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| Credit Ratings: How Credit Quality Affects the Value of Your Bonds | |
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| A Short History of Interest Rates | |
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| The Federal Reserve and Interest Rates | |
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| Summary | |
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| How Much Will I Earn, or Basic Bond Math | |
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| Bond Cash Flows | |
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| The Many Meanings of Yield | |
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| Total Return | |
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| Duration and Bond Price Volatility | |
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| Summary | |
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| What You Need to Know before Buying Bonds | |
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| The Bond Market in the Financial Press and on the Internet | |
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| The Treasury Market | |
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| "Yield Spreads" and Benchmarks | |
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| Investinginbonds.com, FINRA.org/marketdata and EMMA.msrb.org | |
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| Summary | |
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| Individual Securities | |
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| Treasuries, Savings Bonds, and Federal Agency Paper | |
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| What Is Unique about Treasuries? | |
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| Treasury Bills, Notes, and Bonds | |
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| Inflation-Indexed Securities | |
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| Buying Treasuries: Treasury Direct | |
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| Zero Coupon Bonds | |
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| U.S. Savings Bonds | |
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| Federal Agencies | |
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| Summary | |
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| Municipal Bonds | |
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| What Is Unique about Municipal Bonds? | |
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| Should I Buy Munis? (or, Taxable-Equivalent Yield) | |
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| Credit Quality: General Obligation versus Revenue Bonds | |
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| The Rise and Fall of Bond Insurance | |
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| "Recalibrations" of Municipal Bond Ratings | |
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| Municipal Bond Pricing | |
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| Shopping for Municipal Bonds Using the Internet | |
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| Selecting Municipal Bonds | |
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| Summary | |
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| Additional References | |
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| Appendix: The New York City Default | |
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| Corporate Bonds | |
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| What Is Unique about Corporate Bonds? | |
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| Risk Factors of Corporate Bonds | |
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| Corporate Bonds with Special Features | |
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| Junk Bonds | |
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| Shopping for Corporate Bonds Using the Internet | |
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| Summary | |
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| Mortgage-Backed Securities | |
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| Why GNMAs Are Unique | |
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| How Prepayments Affect GNMA Cash Flows | |
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| The Vocabulary of GNMA Returns | |
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| CMOs and Other Sons of GNMA | |
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| Agency Backing of Mortgage-Backed Securities: Ginnie, Fannie, and Freddie | |
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| Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDOs) and Collateralized Debt Swaps (CDSs) | |
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| The Financial Crisis: 2007-2008 | |
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| Current State of the Mortgage-Backed and Asset-Backed Securities Market | |
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| Summary | |
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| Additional References | |
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| International Bonds | |
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| The International Bond Market: An Overview | |
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| Currency Risk | |
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| Emerging Markets Debt: Brady Bonds | |
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| Buying Individual International Bonds | |
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| Is There a Case for Investing in International Bonds? | |
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| Obtaining Information on International Bonds | |
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| Summary | |
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| Investing Through Funds | |
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| Bond Mutual Funds: An Overview | |
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| Differences between Bond Funds and Individual Bonds | |
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| How Much Will I Earn? | |
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| The Costs of Investing in Bond Funds | |
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| Why the NAV of Your Fund Will Go Up and Down | |
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| Selecting, Buying, and Monitoring Bond Funds | |
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| Sources of Information Concerning Bond Funds | |
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| Taxes and Bond Funds | |
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| Summary | |
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| Money Market Funds and Tax-Exempt Bond Funds | |
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| Money Market Funds | |
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| Bond Funds Whose Price Goes Up and Down: "Plain Vanilla" and More Speculative Funds | |
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| Municipal Bond Funds | |
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| Summary | |
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| Taxable Bond Funds | |
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| Domestic "Plain Vanilla" Taxable Bond Funds | |
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| Treasury Inflation Protected Securities Funds | |
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| GNMA (and Other Mortgage) Funds | |
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| More Speculative Funds | |
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| Miscellaneous Funds | |
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| Summary | |
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| Closed-End Bond Funds, Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs), and Unit Investment Trusts | |
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| Closed-End Bond Funds | |
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| Summary: Closed-End Funds | |
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| Sources of Information on CEFs | |
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| Exchange-Traded Funds | |
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| Advantages and Disadvantages of Bond ETFs | |
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| Summary: Exchange-Traded Funds | |
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| Unit Investment Trusts | |
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| Summary: Unit Investment Trusts | |
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| Management of Bond Portfolios and Asset Allocation | |
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| Management of Bond Portfolios | |
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| When Will I Need the Money? | |
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| Portfolio Structures | |
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| Finding Attractive Buy Points | |
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| Swaps | |
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| Managing a Bond Portfolio for Total Return | |
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| Portfolio Allocation | |
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| Portfolio Allocation | |
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| Asset Allocation | |
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| The Case for Bonds Revisited | |
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| The Current Environment and the Bond Market | |
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| Conclusion | |
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| Index | |