While the risk of default is modest, muni bonds are vulnerable to interest rate risk, or the possibility that rising rates may cause prices to decline. This is especially true for investors in municipal bond funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs). If Treasury yields rise (implying that prices fall), muni bonds are quite likely to follow suit. Even if defaults stay low, investors’ principal value will drop.
Is there no risk of municipal bonds defaulting?
- Municipal bonds are a wonderful option for consumers who want to keep their money while earning tax-free income.
- General obligation bonds are used to quickly raise funds to meet expenses, whereas revenue bonds are used to fund infrastructure projects.
- Both general obligation and revenue bonds are tax-free and low-risk investments, with issuers who are quite likely to repay their loans.
- Municipal bonds are low-risk investments, but they are not risk-free because the issuer may fail to make agreed-upon interest payments or be unable to repay the principal at maturity.
Are bonds at risk of default?
If you’ve ever loaned money to someone, you’ve probably considered the likelihood of repayment. Some loans carry a higher risk than others. When it comes to bonds, the same is true. You’re betting that the issuer will keep its pledge to repay principle and pay interest on the agreed-upon dates and terms.
While U.S. Treasury assets are typically considered to be risk-free, most bonds are susceptible to default. This means the bond obligor will either be late paying creditors (including you, as a bondholder), pay a reduced amount, or, in the worst-case scenario, be unable to pay at all.
What happens if a municipal bond fails to pay interest?
Bondholders seldom lose all of their main value in the event of a default. The suspension of the coupon payment is frequently the outcome of a default. Defaulted bonds might become speculative due to their low cost of acquisition.
Are municipal bonds inherently more secure than corporate debts?
When deciding whether to purchase corporate or municipal bonds, there are a number of considerations to consider. The quality of the corporation issuing the bond, the tax consequences, yield, liquidity, and how the money earned through the issuance of the bond will be used are some of the most important of these variables.
Quality of Issuer
The issuer’s quality is one of the first things you should look into before buying a bond or any other financial instrument. Bond issuers will have varying credit ratings, which means that investing in the securities they’ve made accessible exposes you to credit risk.
Bond issuer credit ratings are provided by two agencies: Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s. The rating scale used by Moody’s spans from C to AAA, with AAA being the highest attainable grade. Standard & Poor’s has a rating system that ranges from D to AAA, with AAA being the highest attainable rating.
Higher ratings indicate that the bond’s issuer is less likely to default. After all, individuals who invest in the security stand to lose if the corporation that issued it fails to meet its obligations.
Corporate Bonds Come With Higher Default Rates
Corporations issue corporate bonds, and each corporation is distinct. Some people make more money than others, some have superior management teams, and some will continuously fulfill their duties while others will fail.
Instruments issued by corporations have a higher default risk than municipal bonds, therefore it’s very crucial to pay attention to how rating agencies grade the bond before you invest.
The good news is that even businesses rarely go bankrupt. Only approximately 0.13 percent of companies that issue bonds default, according to the Corporate Finance Institute.
Tax Implications
You must pay taxes on all income you earn, whether it is from a side hustle, your day job, or investment returns. However, not all forms of income are taxed in the same way. When determining whether to invest in corporate or municipal bonds, consider the following tax effects.
How Corporate Bonds Are Taxed
Corporation-issued bonds are sometimes referred to as taxable bonds since the revenues earned from these investments are subject to both federal and state income taxes at the general income tax rate. Your tax bracket determines the exact rate you’ll pay on your returns.
How Municipal Bonds Are Taxed
Gains from municipal bond investments are always tax-free on the federal level and are frequently tax-free on the state level as well. The tax exemption is effectively a “thank you” from both the federal and local governments for investing in projects that benefit your community with your money.
While munis are immune from state and local taxes in the vast majority of circumstances, this is not always the case. If you buy a municipal bond from a municipality other than the one where you live, for example, your local authorities may choose to tax the bond’s returns at the usual local income tax rate.
For example, if you live in New York City and invest in a municipal bond issued by a government body in Florida, New York City may charge you its standard local tax rate on the investment’s profits.
Yields
Bond yields fluctuate dramatically based on the credit of the issuing institution, the maturity period of the bond, and other considerations.
In general, the following is how corporate and municipal bond yields compare:
Corporate Bonds Generally Have Higher Yields
Local governments are well-respected institutions with a track record of good financial management. Corporations, on the other hand, will have a wide range of financial strength and creditworthiness.
Corporate bonds have higher interest rates than government bonds because companies are typically less creditworthy than governments. After all, if corporate bond yields were the same as government bond yields, no one would lend to riskier businesses. Who wants to buy a corporate bond when you may get the same returns by investing in lower-risk municipal bonds?
Munis Provide Small Gains
Bonds issued by the government have a lower risk of default, making them a safer option for investors. When it comes to investing, however, safer options tend to yield lesser returns, and municipal bonds are no exception.
These bonds’ pricing takes into account the extremely minimal default risk, resulting in lower interest rates, smaller interest payments, and poorer overall returns.
That is, until taxes are included in. A high-income earner, for example, may discover that municipal bonds are a better fit because they are tax-free on both the state and federal level. For an investor in the highest tax bracket, however, much of the profit on corporate bonds would be wiped out by taxes.
Liquidity
Whether investing in bonds or any other asset, investors should constantly consider liquidity. The ease or difficulty of changing an investment back into cash, if desired, is referred to as liquidity.
Bonds with low liquidity will be difficult to convert into cash before their maturity dates, whereas bonds with high liquidity will be easy to dump and change into spendable money on demand.
Corporate Bonds Are Often Less Liquid
While any type of bond can be sold on the secondary market, there must be a buyer for the bond to be sold. Investments in high-risk bonds and other corporate bonds may become illiquid in some situations if no other investors are interested in buying them.
Furthermore, when the economy and markets are doing well, bond liquidity decreases. During bull markets, investors prefer not to have their money invested in fixed-income assets, preferring instead to focus on the higher return potential of equities.
Municipal Bonds Are Highly Liquid
The municipal bond market is quite active, and municipal bonds are often easier to sell than corporate bonds. Because muni bonds are issued by entities that are almost certain to meet their commitments while also delivering tax benefits, they are appealing investments for high-income individuals.
How Funds Are Used
Investors are becoming increasingly worried about how their money is being used. In fact, there’s a whole industry devoted to social impact investing, which is investing in assets that use your money to help causes you care about.
So, when you invest in these two different sorts of bonds, how is your money spent?
How Corporations Use Money Raised Through Bond Sales
Corporations may need to raise capital for a variety of reasons. The following are a few of the most common:
- Working Capital is a term used to describe the amount of money Making money takes money, and maintaining a business can be a costly task. Corporations may need working capital for general purposes if their money is locked up in inventory, new equipment, and other assets required to keep them moving in the correct direction. Companies can issue bonds to raise cash for immediate operational requirements while pledging to repay investors later.
- Acquisitions. Companies frequently merge with one another, resulting in deals in which the total worth of all pieces exceeds the value of the original assets. Acquisitions, on the other hand, are a costly business, and companies frequently require additional capital to complete merger and acquisition deals.
- Research. Almost every publicly traded firm on the market today spends a significant amount of money on research and development. Corporations may issue bonds to fund this research in some instances.
How Municipalities Use Money Raised Through Bond Sales
The vast majority of government-issued bonds are used to fund public-sector initiatives.
When a major thoroughfare is riddled with potholes or your county’s library needs to be repaired, for example, governments frequently issue bonds to cover the costs of these projects. Governments can repay investors either through project revenue or tax revenue generated by the projects they fund.
How frequently do municipal bonds go into default?
With all of the high-profile municipal bond failures and scares in recent years, from Vallejo, California, to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, it’s easy to get worried about the typically calm and stable muni bond market. So, with that in mind, I wanted to throw some numbers around about municipal bonds to assist quantify the risks associated with these assets.
Keep in mind that all of the numbers in this article come from one of four places: Standard & Poors, Moody’s, the New York Federal Reserve, and the MSRB (Municipal Securities Ruling Board).
Let’s start with rated municipal bonds, which are those that have been assigned a rating by one of the three major rating agencies: S&P, Moody’s, or Fitch. These bonds are often issued by larger companies and pay lower yields than unrated bonds. As most of you reading this are probably aware, the higher the grade, the lower the bond yields, provided that all other factors (such as maturity) remain constant.
There were 71 defaults on rated municipal bonds between 1970 and 2011, with 46 of these occurring after 1986. Approximately 11,000 municipal bonds were issued during the time period. This means that rated municipal bonds defaulted at a rate of 0.64 percent on average, or around 1 bond out of every 150 issued. This applies to all municipal bonds, including investment grade and non-investment grade, and we’re talking about the default rate for the bond’s whole life, not just one year.
Is it safe to invest in municipal bonds right now?
- Municipal bond interest is tax-free in the United States, however there may be state or local taxes, or both.
- Be aware that if you receive Social Security, your bond interest will be recognized as income when determining your Social Security taxable amount. This could result in you owing more money.
- Municipal bond interest rates are often lower than corporate bond interest rates. You must decide which deal offers the best genuine return.
- On the bright side, compared to practically any other investment, highly-rated municipal bonds are often relatively safe. The default rate is quite low.
- Interest rate risk exists with any bond. You’ll be stuck with a bad performer if your money is locked up for 10 or 20 years and interest rates climb.
Opportunity cost
Municipal bonds’ tax advantages aren’t as valuable if you’re in a lower tax band as they are if you’re in a higher tax bracket.
If that’s the case, you could be better off putting your money into alternative investments for a larger return.
They may not be liquid
If you need money quickly, you should be aware that municipal bonds may have liquidity problems.
You might not be able to find an active market for your bonds, which means you won’t be able to sell them when you want at the price you want.
Is it possible to sell defaulted bonds?
What bondholders receive after a default, and when they receive it, is uncertain in advance. A defaulted bond might be sold on the secondary market or held through the bankruptcy process, but the proceeds would likely be significantly less than the bond’s original value.
Which bond is the most likely to default?
- Junk bonds, often known as high-yield bonds, are corporate bonds issued by corporations with a high risk of defaulting. To compensate for the danger, they provide higher interest rates.
- Preferred stocks are nominally stocks, yet they have the same characteristics as bonds. They make regular payments to you in the form of a predetermined dividend. In the event of a bankruptcy, they are marginally safer than stocks. After bondholders, but before common stockholders, holders are paid.
- Certificates of deposit are similar to bonds that your bank issues. You essentially lend your money to the bank for a set length of time in exchange for a guaranteed fixed rate of return.