As per topic, Treasury bills, treasury notes, govt saving bonds... any idea what are the interest rates for each of them?? the interest is compounded or?? able to cash out at maturity??
any of u all buy or gging to buy it?? any idea wats the diff btwn these 3 diff types?? thks
So, firstly, you only need one question mark at the end of a sentence that contains a question, like this? If you put two question marks at the end of a sentence, eventually there might be a global shortage of question marks, and we'd have to end our questions with full stops.
Anyway.
I think you might have been looking at US-specific pages - "Treasury" (and "treasury note") is a US-specific bond market term. Let's look at the Singaporean market specifics.
"Bills", "bonds", and "SSBs" (Singapore Savings Bonds) are all debt obligations of the Singapore government: you're lending money to the government, and they promise to pay it back in however many years. ("SGS" - Singapore Government Securities - is a blanket term for all those three products.)
"Bills" are short-dated SGS, expiring in one year or less. They don't pay interest; instead, they're sold at a discount to their face value (so, for example, you might pay $995 for a one-year $1,000 T-bill). In a year's time, you get back $1000 in return for the $995 you originally paid.
"Bonds" are longer-dated, and they pay interest - so, let's say you buy a 10-year $1,000 bond with a 2% "coupon" (the stated interest rate on the bond). Each year, you'll get paid $20 interest (the "coupon payment" - actually it comes as two half-yearly payments of $10, rather than a yearly payment of $20, but you get the idea), and at the end of the 10 years, you get your $1000 back as well.
SSBs are slightly different - they were created as a way to encourage people to invest in sensible, low-cost stuff like government bonds. SSBs are like regular Singapore government bonds, but they pay an
increasing coupon - the longer you hold the bond, the higher the coupon payments. And you still get your initial investment back at maturity.
(Since you brought it up, as well - the US also distinguishes between "bills" and "bonds", but they also add "notes" in the middle. If it doesn't pay a coupon, it's a "bill"; if it pays a coupon and it matures in less than ten years, it's a "note"; if it matures in more than 10 years, it's a "bond". The 30-year bond is colloquially "the long bond".)
