(01-04-2015, 10:07 AM)NTL Wrote: will not expect the first or second year interest to be high.
I thought the infographic from BT has already given a good idea of the rates mechanism. Quote: "average interest paid from the start through a particular year will match the yield on a Singapore Government Security that matured in that year and had been bought at the start." (Greentea has posted the link some posts earlier).
If I read correctly, the rates are locked in and pegged to the SGS at the onset of the issue i.e. if the bond is issued today, they will read the SGS yield curve today, lock-in the tenor pts, and the bootstrap their way up.
So suppose the 1-10y SGS yields are 1%, 2%.....10% at the start of the issue (highly exaggerated numbers)
then the saving bonds rate will be
yr 1: 1%
yr 2: 2*2-1=3%
yr 3: 3*3-1-3=5%
yr x: (SGS yield for x)*x - sum of all coupons before
and so on (adjust for discounting)
Essentially, if e.g. you cash out on yr 3, you will receive 5+3+1=9% from the savings bond, which is similar to that received by a holder of a 3y SGS held to maturity 3*3 = 9%
Another way to think abt it, is that suppose you go short a 3y SGS and buy the savings bond and cash out on the third year, there should be no arbitrage opportunities.
To me, it makes the SGS <10y redundant, since this is essentially the SGS+a free put at par (and something free is always good!). The only bad thing is that since these are not traded, you don't get the flight to safety effect of riskfree bonds - so the -ve correlation element in the ptf is missing (when risks sell off, riskfree goes up).
To me:
if you are in cash, you will want savings bond since you don't lose anything.
if you are in FD, you might not want savings bond esp if the curve is flat and you think rates are not going down
if you are in SGS, you prob want savings bond since you gain a free put, although you lose out on capital appreciation opportunities if risks collapse.
devil is in the details, esp the investment cap.