New Features on MunicipalBonds.com
November 8, 2009
Over the past few months, we have added a wealth of historical data and tools to help retail investors gain greater transparency into the municipal bond market. Key highlights:
- Every bond trade going back to 2004 is searchable.
- Real-time trading data on a minute-by-minute basis is available for free.
- S&P ratings are available alongside daily real-time trade data for premium members; this is something not available to individual investors anywhere else.
- By clicking the ‘plus’ symbol next to any bond trade, investors can add an issue or issuer to their personal portfolio for ongoing tracking.
- Investors can access the official statements easily for every issue.
- Dealer spread reports are available for every state enabling investors to see exactly how wide bid-ask spreads are in their state.
Over the next couple of months, we’re probably going to add research empowering investors to evaluate municipalities and understand the rationale behind municipal bond ratings.
MunicipalBonds.com press release
December 11, 2008
New Site for Retail Investors Launching January 21, 2009
New Canaan, CT -
MunicipalBonds.com announced today that it plans on launching a new site on January 21, 2009.
“We’re excited about developing the premier site for municipal bond investors. When we launch, individual investors will have a whole new way of understanding, analyzing, purchasing, and managing their municipal bond investments,” said Bhu Srinivasan, publisher of MunicipalBonds.com.
Background:
“I first ran into this site, MunicipalBonds.com, back in April when I was personally looking for more information on municipal bonds. I didn’t find a good, independent site dedicated to individual municipal bond investors,” said Bhu Srinivasan. “With the MunicipalBonds.com domain underutilized in a very big way, I decided to acquire the domain to build a content platform for municipal bonds. We’re starting with the best domain in municipal bonds, MunicipalBonds.com.”
MunicipalBonds.com is going to benefit from four major trends:
1. Demographics. Baby boomers are going to start turning 65 starting in 2010. This huge segment of the investor population will need income from their investments and absolute capital preservation.
2. Disillusionment with other asset classes: Investors have been burned across the board in 2008. The S&P 500 is exactly where it was in 1998. Real estate doesn’t seem safe. Commodities are not for common investors. That leaves bonds. Historically, municipal bonds have been the safest, most conservative investment this side of cash and US Treasuries.
3. Likelihood of Tax Increases: The new President and the individual states will increase income tax rates in the next couple of years, especially on high-income households. Municipal bonds offer tax-free income. Retirees are going to want to protect their income from taxes and hedge against tax increases.
4. Mistrust of Money Managers: Investors are realizing that money managers are better at selling money management services than they are at actual money management. The investor class of this country is going to go back to exerting greater control over their portfolios with direct purchases of municipal bonds.
Retail Investors in 2009:
A Marketing Platform for Issuers, Broker-Dealers, Underwriters, and Bond Funds
Retail investors will be more important than ever in 2009. Any new issue will need to generate demand among retail investors to be successful. MunicipalBonds.com is creating the ultimate marketing platform to reach retail investors.
Said Bhu: “Even before we launch, we’re already one of the top 3 search results for ‘Municipal Bonds’ on all of the major search engines. For terms such as ‘California Municipal Bonds’, ‘New York Municipal Bonds’, ‘Texas Municipal Bonds’, we’re generally number 1. We are going to leverage our search engine advantage and our brand to launch in a big way.”
More Press:
Bloomberg on MunicipalBonds.com
