Word: interest
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...ground. Pitched against Abhisit, the scion of an old Thai-Chinese family with connections to the country's royalty, is Thaksin, who is everything the current PM is not: a brash, populist, new-money billionaire who was sentenced in absentia to two years in jail on a conflict-of-interest conviction. Both camps have amassed vocal - and occasionally violent - supporters among a general populace that is ever more politically disillusioned. Results of a recently released nationwide poll by the nonprofit Asia Foundation found that less than one-third of Thais feel the country is moving in the right direction...
...They lost money on their house, they lost money on stocks," says Tom Atteberry, co-manager of the FPA New Income mutual fund. "They put money in bonds because they think it's safe. Then interest rates are going to rise on them, and they're going to lose money on bonds...
...bonds. When you buy stock, you get part ownership of a company. If it does well, you share in the gains. If it flounders, you lose money. Bonds, on the other hand, represent a promise from a company or government or other borrower to pay you back, with interest. When you buy a bond, you're making a loan. Sometimes bond issuers (a.k.a. borrowers) renege on their promises. The financial crisis originated with a rash of defaults on subprime mortgages that had been packaged into bonds. But the bond risks that vex Atteberry have little to do with that default...
Right now the interest rate on a 10-year Treasury bond is about 3.5%. That could go lower - in fact, it did go lower at the height of the panic last fall, to just above 2%. But the likeliest future path for Treasury yields, Atteberry figures - on the basis of history and the fact that rates have been kept low this year by Federal Reserve purchases, investor demand and other factors - is up. If you own a 10-year Treasury bond yielding 3.5%, interest rates rising to 4% or 5% or higher mean your bond (with its rate stuck...
Atteberry is hoping to navigate the minefield ahead by holding only bonds that come due soon, which are less sensitive to changes in interest rates (but also have a lower yield than longer-dated bonds). He may ask FPA New Income's board for permission to increase the fund's limit on foreign bond holdings from its current 10%. And he has positive things to say about the inflation-indexed bonds that Treasury has issued since 1997, although he doesn't think they're a particularly good deal...