Buying Investment-Grade U.S. Bonds

Investment-grade bonds have been surprisingly strong performers this year in defiance of conventional wisdom.

One way to take advantage of rising bond prices is through the iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF (AGG), an exchange-traded fund (ETF) that focuses on investment-grade U.S. bonds. As its name implies, the ETF invests in U.S.-based bonds such as Treasuries and high-quality corporate bonds.

With $43.83 billion in total assets, a daily trading volume of $265.3 million and a whopping 6,203 total holdings in its portfolio, AGG is an enormous fund. However, it operates with high efficiency and high liquidity, boasting an expense ratio of only 0.05%, which is considerably lower than most of its rivals.

AGG maintains its liquidity by only lightly investing (about 11%) in long-term bonds that have a maturity date of 20 years or more. Instead, 85% of AGG’s bonds have a maturity date of less than 10 years.

A bond is considered investment grade, if its credit rating is BBB- or higher, as determined by Standard & Poor’s. Roughly 72% of bonds held by AGG are AAA rated, and about 28% are rated in the range of AA to BBB.

Bear in mind that bonds tend to move in the opposite direction of stocks. They also tend to be sensitive to changes in interest rates, so pay attention to any expected rate hikes from the Fed and make sure you take appropriate action.

From the chart below, you can see that AGG took a hit during the “Trump Rally” in the stock markets, starting in November 2016. Since the beginning of the year though, AGG recently has been on a path to recovery. Year to date, AGG has a return of 1.68%, versus the S&P 500’s return of 5.54%. AGG has a distribution yield of 2.67%.

AGG’s top five holdings are the U.S. Treasury, 36.86%; Federal National Mortgage Association, 14.20%; Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation – Gold, 7.45%; Government National Mortgage Association II, 7.25%; and Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, 0.75%.

If you are seeking dedicated exposure to U.S. investment-grade bonds during their surprising rise this year, I encourage you to look into iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF (AGG) as a potential investment.

Jim Woods

Jim Woods is a 20-plus-year veteran of the markets with varied experience as a broker, hedge fund trader, financial writer, author and newsletter editor. Jim is the editor of Intelligence Report, Investing Edge, the Bullseye Stock Trader, and The Deep Woods (formerly the Weekly ETF Report). His books include co-authoring, “Billion Dollar Green: Profit from the Eco Revolution,” and “The Wealth Shield: How to Invest and Protect Your Money from Another Stock Market Crash, Financial Crisis or Global Economic Collapse.” He’s also ghostwritten many books and articles, as well as edited content for some of the investment industry’s biggest luminaries. His articles have appeared on many leading financial websites, including StockInvestor.com, InvestorPlace.com, Main Street Investor, MarketWatch, Street Authority, Human Events and many others. Jim formerly worked with Investor’s Business Daily founder William J. O’Neil, helping to author training courses in the CANSLIM stock-picking methodology. The independent firm TipRanks rates Jim the No. 3 financial blogger in the world (out of more than 6,000). TipRanks calculates that, since 2012, he's made 361 successful recommendations out of 499 total, earning a success rate of 72% and a +15.3% average return per recommendation. He is known in professional and personal circles as “The Renaissance Man,” because his expertise includes such varied fields as composing and performing music; Western horsemanship, combat marksmanship, martial arts, auto racing and bodybuilding. Jim holds a BA in philosophy from the University of California, Los Angeles, and is a former U.S. Army paratrooper. A self-described “radical for capitalism,” he celebrates the virtue of making money from his Southern California horse ranch.