Short bonds

Similar financial terms

Short-term bonds
Bonds with a maturity of between one and five years.

Short selling
Short selling, usually just referred to as "shorting", involves selling an asset that is not in posession. Suppose an investor instructs a broker to short 20,000 STL shares. The broker will carry out the instructions by borrowing the shares from another client and selling them in the market in the usual way. The investor can maintain the short position for as long as desired, provided there are always shares for the broker to borrow. At some stage, however, the investor will close out the positi ...

Short-squeezed
If the broker runs out of shares to borrow at any time while a short contract is open, the investor is short-squeezed and is forced to close out the position immediately even if not ready to do so.

Short Term Gain
The profit realized from the sale of securities or other capital assets possessed for twelve months or less.

Creditors, short
This is all current liabilities payable on demand or within one year of the Balance Sheet date. For Banks this also includes short term bank liabilities such as deposits.

Synthetic short sale
Buy one put option and write one call option.

Short-term tax exempts
Short-term securities issued by states, municipalities, local housing agencies, and urban renewal agencies.

Short-term solvency ratios
Ratios used to judge the adequacy of liquid assets for meeting short-term obligations as they come due, including (a) the current ratio, (b) the acid-test ratio, (c) the inventory turnover ratio, and (d) the accounts receivable turnover ratio.

Short-term investment services
Services that assist firms in making short-term investments.

Short-term financial plan
A financial plan that covers the coming fiscal year.

Short-run operating activities
Events and decisions concerning the short-term finance of a firm, such as how much inventory to order and whether to offer cash terms or credit terms to customers.

Shortfall risk
The risk of falling short of any investment target.

Shortage cost
Costs that fall with increases in the level of investment in current assets.

Short straddle
A straddle in which one put and one call are sold.

Short sale
Selling a security that the seller does not own but is committed to repurchasing eventually. It is used to capitalize on an expected decline in the security's price.

Short position
Occurs when a person sells stocks he or she does not yet own. Shares must be borrowed, before the sale, to make "good delivery" to the buyer. Eventually, the shares must be bought to close out the transaction. This technique is used when an investor believes the stock price will go down.

Short interest
This is the total number of shares of a security that investors have borrowed, then sold in the hope that the security will fall in value. An investor then buys back the shares and pockets the difference as profit.

Short hedge
The sale of a futures contract(s) to eliminate or lessen the possible decline in value ownership of an approximately equal amount of the actual financial instrument or physical commodity.

Short
One who has sold a contract to establish a market position and who has not yet closed out this position through an offsetting purchase; the opposite of a long position.

Selling short
If an investor thinks the price of a stock is going down, the investor could borrow the stock from a broker and sell it. Eventually, the investor must buy the stock back on the open market. For instance, you borrow 1000 shares of British Petroleum on July 1 and sell it for £8 per share. Then, on Aug 1, you purchase 1000 shares of BP at £7 per share. You've made £1000 (less commissions and other fees) by selling short.

Medium-term or intermediate-term bonds
Bonds with a maturity of between five and twelve years.

Long-term bonds
Bonds with a maturity of more than 12 years.

Zero-coupon bonds
The holder of a zero-coupon bond realizes interest by buying the bond at a discount to its principal value. These bonds made their debut in the U.S. bond market in the early 1980s.

Deferred-coupon bonds
Bonds that let the issuer avoid using cash to make interest payments for a specified number of years. There are three types of deferred-coupon structures: (a) deferred-interest bonds, (b) step-up bonds and (c) payment-in-kind bonds.

Call feature on bonds
A call feature grants the issue the right to retire the debt, fully or partially, before the scheduled maturity date. Inclusion of a call feature benefits bond issuers by allowing them to replace an old bond issue with a lower-interest cost issue if interest rates in the market fall.

Put provision on bonds
A put provision grants the bondholder the right to sell the issue back to the issuer at par value on designated dates. Here the advantage to the investor is that if interest rates rise after the issue date, thereby reducing a bond’s price, the investor can force the issuer to redeem the bond at par value.

Interest-rate risk on bonds
The price of a typical bond will change in the opposite direction from a change in interest rates. As interest rates rise, the price of a bond will fall; as interest rates fall, the price of a bond will rise. The actual degree of sensitivity of a bond’s price to changes in market interest rates depends on various characteristics of the issue maturity, coupon and special provisions.

Reinvestment risk on bonds
Usually, when the yield of a bond is calculated, you assume that the coupons received before maturity are reinvested. The additional income from such reinvestment is sometimes referred to as interest-on-interest which depends on the prevailing interest-rate levels at the time of reinvestment. Volatility in the reinvestment rate of a given strategy because of changes in market interest rates is called reinvestment risk. This risk is that the interest rate at which interim cash flows can be reinve ...

Call risk on bonds
Many bonds include a call feature that allows the issuer to redeem or “call” all or part of the issue before the maturity date. The issuer usually retains this right in order to have flexibility to refinance the bond in the future if the market interest rate drops below the coupon rate. This implies three risks from the investor: (a) The cash flow pattern becomes uncertain, (b) The investor becomes exposed to reinvestment risk because the issuer will call the bond when interest rates drop, and ( ...

Default risk on bonds
Issuers that potentially run into cash flow problems, simultaneously attaches default risk to their bonds if there is uncertainty whether they can afford to pay coupons and principals. Bonds with default risk trade in the market at a price that is lower than comparable U.S. Treasury securities, which are considered free of default risk. Default risk is gauged by quality ratings assigned by recognised rating companies such as Moody’s Investor Service, Standard & Poor’s Corporation, Morningstar an ...

Junk bonds
Bonds that trade below investment grade set by recognised rating companies such as Moody’s Investor Service (Baa3), Standard & Poor’s Corporation (BBB), Morningstar and Fitch IBCA.

Inflation risk on bonds
If investors purchase a bond on which they can realize a coupon rate of 5% but the rate of inflation is 6%, the purchasing power of the cash flow actually has declined. Inflation risk arises because of the variation in the value of cash flows from a security due to inflation, as measured in terms of purchasing power.

Exchange-rate risk on bonds
A non-domestic-currency nominated bond has unknown domestic currency cash flows. The domestic currency cash flows are dependent on the exchange rate at the time the payments are received. For example, suppose that a German investor purchases a bond whose payments are in British pounds (GBP). If pounds depreciate relative to euros (EUR), fewer euros will be received and vice versa. This risk is also referred to currency risk.

Liquidity risk on bonds
The primary measure of liquidity is the size of the bid-ask spread. Liquidity risk depends on the ease with which an issue can be sold at or near its value. It follows that the wider the dealer spread, the more liquidity risk.

Brady bonds
Brady bonds are issued by emerging countries under a debt-reduction plan named after former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Nicholas Brady. Brady bonds were set up in association with the IMF and World Bank to sponsor the restructuring of outstanding sovereign loans and interest arrears into liquid debt instruments.

Conventional bonds
The conventional bonds form the largest part of the UK gilt market. 73% of bonds oustanding are in this form. COnventional bonds have a fixed coupon and a bullet (i.e. a fixed) maturity. Current coupons range from 2% to 13.5%. At the moment (2004), the longest outstanding maturity is 2036.

Irredeemable bonds
Bonds with a fixed maturity but not subject to prior redemption; bonds that cannot be called for redemption by the issuer (payer or obligor) before maturity. They should not be confused with perpetual bonds or intermediate bonds. UK Irredeemable (undated) bonds have no final maturity date. They are callable by the government at any time within 3 months. As their coupons range between 2.5% and 4% they are unlikely to be called. War loan, issued by the UK government during the First World War ...

Yankee bonds
Yankee bonds are issued by foreign governments and corporations, are generally dollar denominated, trade in the U.S., and must register with the Security and Exchange Commission. Issuers in the Yankee bond market are predominately highly-rated sovereign, or sovereign guaranteed issuers, although foreign corporations and financial institutions have increased issuance of Yankee bonds over the last decade.

Issuance in the Yankee bond market is dependent on U.S. interest rates, and the valu ...

Matador bonds
Foreign bonds issued in Spain.

Rembrandt bonds
Foreign bonds issued in Netherlands.

Samurai bonds
Foreign bonds issued in Japan.

Bulldog bonds
Foreign bonds issued in the United Kingdom.

Shogun bonds
Shogun bonds consist of foreign-currency bonds issued in Tokyo in currencies other that Japanese yen (JPY).

Yankee ECU bonds
Yankee ECU bonds refers to foreign-currency bonds issued in New York or Chicago in currencies other that US dollar.

Term bonds
Often referred to as bullet-maturity bonds or simply bullet bonds, bonds whose principal is payable at maturity.

Serial bonds
Corporate bonds arranged so that specified principal amounts become due on specified dates.

Long bonds
Bonds with a long current maturity. The "long bond" is the 30-year U.S. government bond.

Collateral trust bonds
A bond in which the issuer (often a holding company) grants investors a lien on stocks, notes, bonds, or other financial asset as security.

Convertible bonds
Bonds that can be converted into common stock at the option of the holder.

Corporate bonds
Debt obligations issued by corporations.

Cushion bonds
High-coupon bonds that sell at only at a moderate premium because they are callable at a price below that at which a comparable non-callable bond would sell. Cushion bonds offer considerable downside protection in a falling market.

General Obligation Bonds
Securities issued by municipalities. The source of revenue to pay the interest and principal is taxes. These securities are also known as full faith and credit issues because they depend on the municipality's capacity to tax. These issues are often considered to be more stable than Revenue Bonds.

Strip Bonds
The capital portion of a bond from which the coupons have been stripped. The holder of the strip bond is entitled to its par value at maturity, but not the annual interest payments.