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Is SWRSX a Strong Bond Fund Right Now?

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Any investors who are searching for Mutual Fund Bond funds should take a look at Schwab Treasury Inflation Protected Security (SWRSX - Free Report) . SWRSX has no Zacks Mutual Fund Rank, but we have been able to look into other metrics like performance, volatility, and cost.

History of Fund/Manager

Schwab Funds is based in San Francisco, CA, and is the manager of SWRSX. Schwab Treasury Inflation Protected Security debuted in March of 2006. Since then, SWRSX has accumulated assets of about $2.59 billion, according to the most recently available information. Matthew Hastings is the fund's current manager and has held that role since March of 2006.

Performance

Of course, investors look for strong performance in funds. SWRSX has a 5-year annualized total return of 2.64% and it sits in the middle third among its category peers. Investors who prefer analyzing shorter time frames should look at its 3-year annualized total return of -1.56%, which places it in the middle third during this time-frame.

It is important to note that the product's returns may not reflect all its expenses. Any fees not reflected would lower the returns. Total returns do not reflect the fund's [%] sale charge. If sales charges were included, total returns would have been lower.

When looking at a fund's performance, it is also important to note the standard deviation of the returns. The lower the standard deviation, the less volatility the fund experiences. Over the past three years, SWRSX's standard deviation comes in at 7.06%, compared to the category average of 7.38%. The fund's standard deviation over the past 5 years is 6.17% compared to the category average of 6.65%. This makes the fund less volatile than its peers over the past half-decade.

SWRSX carries a beta of 0.65, meaning that the fund is less volatile than a broad market index of fixed income securities. With this in mind, it has a positive alpha of 1.8, which measures performance on a risk-adjusted basis.

Expenses

For investors, taking a closer look at cost-related metrics is key, since costs are increasingly important for mutual fund investing. Competition is heating up in this space, and a lower cost product will likely outperform its otherwise identical counterpart, all things being equal. In terms of fees, SWRSX is a no load fund. It has an expense ratio of 0.05% compared to the category average of 0.52%. So, SWRSX is actually cheaper than its peers from a cost perspective.

This fund requires a minimum initial investment of $0, while there is no minimum for each subsequent investment.

Fees charged by investment advisors have not been taken into considiration. Returns would be less if those were included.

Bottom Line

This could just be the start of your research on SWRSXin the Mutual Fund Bond category. Consider going to www.zacks.com/funds/mutual-funds for additional information about this fund, and all the others that we rank as well for additional information. If you want to check out our stock reports as well, make sure to go to Zacks.com to see all of the great tools we have to offer, including our time-tested Zacks Rank.


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