Reinvestment Risk

Explained:

reinvestment risk


 
 

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Reinvestment risk is risk from uncertainty in the interest rate at which future cash flows may be invested.

Suppose an institutional investor has USD 50MM to invest for ten years. If the institution pays par value for a 10-year bond, which pays a 6% semi-annual coupon, it will not be sure to earn a 6% rate of return on its investment. This is because the bond will pay coupons, which will have to be reinvested. The rate at which the coupons are reinvested will depend upon prevailing interest rates at the time those coupons are received. Reinvestment risk can be addressed through such techniques as cash-flow matching and gap analysis.

As another example, suppose a bank has a liability maturing in five years and an offsetting asset maturing in three years. It is paying 4% interest on the liability and earning 5% interest at on the asset, so the position is profitable. However, the asset is going to mature two years before the liability. At that time, the bank will have to reinvest the proceeds from the asset. It may not earn 5% for the remaining two years. If interest rates have fallen, it could end up earning 3% on the assets while paying 4% on the liability.

Reinvestment risk contributes to term structure risk.

Related Internal Links

asset-liability management Techniques for protecting a firm's solvency in the context of accrual accounting.

bond Securitized debt.

compounding Simple, compound and continuously compound interest.

duration and convexity Factor sensitivities often used in asset-liability management.

financial risk management Practices by which a firm optimizes the manner in which it takes financial risk.

fixed income term structure Refers collectively to a spot curve, forward curve, discount curve, yield curve or any other curve that describes the time value of money at a particulate point in time.

gap analysis A technique of asset-liability management used to assess interest rate risk or liquidity risk.

Interest rate risk Risk due to uncertain future interest rates.

interest rate spreads Spreads between two interest rates.

liquidity Used in various senses, all relating to availability of, access to, or convertibility into cash.

par value A stated value for a security.

return Any of a number of metrics for the change in an asset's or portfolio's accumulated value

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