Yield information on bond funds UK ?

[bluejeansman]

Vanguard US funds display the 30 day SEC yield : Example : VBTLX shows 4.04% 30 day SEC yield. Useful to know.

I am finding it hard to get this info for UK bond funds : Example :
UK Govt bond index fund : https://www.vanguardinvestor.co.uk/inve ... c/overview
Global Bond Index fund : https://www.vanguardinvestor.co.uk/inve ... c/overview

- I am struggling to see the yield. for some reason I suspect it doesnt even pay as much as high street savings bank account. I hope I am wrong.

appreciate any replies. Thanks

[bluejeansman]

I found the yield info on morningstar, but unable to find it on Vanguard UK website.

https://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/ ... F000003VEE (1.72)
https://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/ ... F000003VEC (1.87)

Why is the yield so poor on the above, given that interest rates have gone up ?

The US total bond market fund is returning a solid 4%
https://investor.vanguard.com/investmen ... file/vbtlx

Thanks

[daviddem]

Struggling to understand this also, given that the underlying index is yielding >4%

https://www.spglobal.com/spdji/en/indic ... /#overview

edit: I think this explains it. Distribution yield (listed on Morningstar) does not equate yield-to-maturity or yield-to-worst, which are the metrics that matter.

The yield-to-worst of the UK bond fund is 3.91%, available on the most recent factsheet I could find:

https://api.fundinfo.com/document/4776d ... 415da9e581

[StillGoing]

Vanguard US funds display the 30 day SEC yield : Example : VBTLX shows 4.04% 30 day SEC yield. Useful to know.

I am finding it hard to get this info for UK bond funds : Example :
UK Govt bond index fund : https://www.vanguardinvestor.co.uk/inve ... c/overview
Global Bond Index fund : https://www.vanguardinvestor.co.uk/inve ... c/overview

- I am struggling to see the yield. for some reason I suspect it doesnt even pay as much as high street savings bank account. I hope I am wrong.

appreciate any replies. Thanks

The yield quoted in the links you gave is a backward looking one (i.e. the yield over the last year) - in a period of rising rates this looks rather unattractive!

One way to see the rising distributions is to look at the income version of the fund. For example, the UK govt bond index had distributions per unit* of 0.55, 0.48, 0.38, and 0.35 in Mar 2023, Dec 2022, Sep 2022, and June 2022, respectively.

* unit prices dropped after the mini budget, but were, from recent to oldest, £104, £102, £101, £118 for the 4 quarters (giving quarterly distributions, of 0.5%, 0.5%, 0.4%, and 0.3%)

As others have said, this is not the same as the yield to maturity but the morningstar data linked by others (https://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/ ... 3VEE&tab=3) does contain the yield to maturity (currently around 3.7% on a duration of 10.5 years)