The Intelligent Investor_ The Definitive Book on Value Investing - Benjamin Graham [41]
Owners of Series E bonds may cash them in at any time (shortly after purchase) at their current redemption value. Holders of Series H bonds have similar rights to cash them in at par value (cost). Series E bonds are exchangeable for Series H bonds, with certain tax advantages. Bonds lost, destroyed, or stolen may be replaced without cost. There are limitations on annual purchases, but liberal provisions for co-ownership by family members make it possible for most investors to buy as many as they can afford. Comment: There is no other investment that combines (1) absolute assurance of principal and interest payments, (2) the right to demand full “money back” at any time, and (3) guarantee of at least a 5% interest rate for at least ten years. Holders of the earlier issues of Series E bonds have had the right to extend their bonds at maturity, and thus to continue to accumulate annual values at successively higher rates. The deferral of income-tax payments over these long periods has been of great dollar advantage; we calculate it has increased the effective net-after-tax rate received by as much as a third in typical cases. Conversely, the right to cash in the bonds at cost price or better has given the purchasers in former years of low interest rates complete protection against the shrinkage in principal value that befell many bond investors; otherwise stated, it gave them the possibility of benefiting from the rise in interest rates by switching their low-interest holdings into very-high-coupon issues on an even-money basis.
In our view the special advantages enjoyed by owners of savings bonds now will more than compensate for their lower current return as compared with other direct government obligations.
2. OTHER UNITED STATES BONDS. Aprofusion of these issues exists, covering a wide variety of coupon rates and maturity dates. All of them are completely safe with respect to payment of interest and principal. They are subject to Federal income taxes but free from state income tax. In late 1971 the long-term issues—over ten years—showed an average yield of 6.09%, intermediate issues (three to five years) returned 6.35%, and short issues returned 6.03%.
In 1970 it was possible to buy a number of old issues at large discounts. Some of these are accepted at par in settlement of estate taxes. Example: The U.S. Treasury 3½s due 1990 are in this category; they sold at 60 in 1970, but closed 1970 above 77.
It is interesting to note also that in many cases the indirect obligations of the U.S. government yield appreciably more than its direct obligations of the same maturity. As we write, an offering appears of 7.05% of “Certificates Fully Guaranteed by the Secretary of Transportation of the Department of Transportation of the United States.” The yield was fully 1% more than that on direct obligations of the U.S., maturing the same year (1986). The certificates were actually issued in the name of the Trustees of the Penn Central Transportation Co., but they were sold on the basis of a statement by the U.S. Attorney General that the guarantee “brings into being a general obligation of the United States, backed by its full faith and credit.” Quite a number of indirect obligations of this sort have been assumed by the U.S. government in the past, and all of them have been scrupulously honored.
The reader may wonder why all this hocus-pocus, involving an apparently “personal guarantee” by our Secretary of Transportation, and a higher cost to the taxpayer in the end. The chief reason for the indirection has been the debt limit imposed on government borrowing by the Congress. Apparently guarantees by the government are not regarded as debts—a semantic windfall for shrewder investors. Perhaps the chief impact of this situation has been the creation of tax-free Housing Authority bonds, enjoying the equivalent of a U.S. guarantee, and virtually the only