source: freeGraphicToday (Pixabay)
Here’s a list of 10 articles I found that provide information about Inflation Protected Bonds. Learn more about how I Bonds and TIPS work and good reasons to use them for long-term savings.
Zvi Bodie: I Bonds Are Best for Most Investors
by ThinkAdvisor.com
This is an interview with Professor Zvi Bodie about the safest way to invest for your retirement needs. He explains the clear benefits and why he believes that more people need to hear about this ultra-safe way to prepare for retirement.
This overview of I Bonds briefly explains their benefits and how they compare to other investments in general. It describes I Bonds as a safer investment than other kinds of investments. It has some very helpful graphics. I believe is the best site about I Bonds I have found. You might want to spend some time here looking around at all it has to offer. This site also sports an up-to-date display of the current interest rate being offered by I Bonds in the upper right hand corner and contains great quotes that people have made about the benefits of I Bonds.
by Fidelity Viewpoints, Fidelity Investments
This article provides a good overview of TIPS from an investment perspective. It also has a discussion about ETFs that give smaller investors access to something called Floating Rate Loans. I’m not a fan of those at this time, but this article does have a discussion of those as well.
Hedge Your Bets With Inflation-Linked Bonds
by Christina Granville, Investopedia
This article give some great background on the history of Inflation Linked Bonds and provides a brief overview of how they relate to investments in an investment strategy. I tend to not care about investment strategies in that I use inflation protected bonds for long-term savings. This article also provides the names the inflation protected bonds available in other countries. Don’t get too concerned about the discussion about deflation. She mentions at the end, it doesn’t apply to those of us using it for long-term savings. I intend to address that issue in another article.
The Investment TIPS You Should Care About
by Wade Pfau on Forbes
This article is directed toward those of you who already think in investing terms. It’s a bit technical compared to some of the other articles. The author discusses some of the oddities regarding TIPS and their relationship to other bond investments. He briefly discusses the idea of real and nominal yield and the difference in thinking that goes along with investing in TIPS.
TIPS: Understanding Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities
by Dan Caplinger on The Motley Fool
This is a great article that covers the history that the United States had with the bond market and inflation during the 1970s and 80s. It does a great job of explaining the benefit and protection that TIPS provide. The article concludes by recommending ETFs and Mutual Funds. I’m not a huge fan of funds. I hope to explain my viewpoint in a future article, but I have held them at times because I believe that they are some of the safest ones to hold. This article is not very technical and a great one to read to get some background on TIPS.
by Thomas Kenny at The Balance
One of the most alarming and confusing things to discover about investing in TIPS is that they can show a negative yield during certain times in the economy. This article explains why that happens. This is another topic I hope to make more clear in the future as well. It’s good to note that your bank account has been giving you negative yields for several years in a row when you adjust your returns for inflation. TIPS are just more easily exposed when this happens. You can choose to not buy TIPS when they go negative.
Tracking Inflation and I Bonds
by TIPS Watch
This is a page on a site all about TIPS that tracks the interest rates of I Bonds. It also explains how I Bond rates are calculated. If you want to see the history of I Bond rates, you can see that on this tracking page.
This is the United States Treasury Department’s information on I Bonds. You can get all of the most accurate and latest information here including the current interest rates and how they are calculated. If you want to buy them, you are only a few clicks away.
Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS)
Here is the United States Treasury Departments description of TIPS. This is where you will find the most up-to-date information on them. It’s not that hard to understand but you may need to invest a little time reading and thinking about it. I don’t think you need to know much about investing to understand what it said here. You can also buy TIPS directly from this site.
Bonus Articles
How to Buy an I Bond
If you are ready to buy an I Bond but don’t know how to get around at TreasuryDirect.gov, I can help you with that here.
Stressed about Savings? Divide and Conquer
You might consider a strategy that separates savings from your more risky endeavors. Here’s how I like to think about it.
Inflation Protection and Taxes
Taxes are a real problem when it comes to inflation protecting your savings. Learn more about that here.