Current return

Current Yield

The income from dividends (for stocks) or coupons (for bonds) divided by the market price of the security, expressed as a percentage. This is sometimes used in making the decision of whether or not to buy a security, but it does not accurately reflect its return, as the market price changes constantly. It is also called the current return or the running yield.

Current return.

Current return, also called current yield, is the amount of interest you earn on a bond in any given year, expressed as a percent of the current market price.

The current return will, in most cases, not be the same as the coupon rate, or the interest rate the bond pays calculated as a percentage of its par value.

For example, if the par, or face value, of a bond is $1,000 and the coupon rate is 5%, then the interest payments, or annual income, from the bond is $50 per year. If, however, the bond is trading at $900, then that $50 annual income is actually a current return of 5.6%.

The current return does not take capital gains or losses into account, so it is not a reflection of the total return on your bond investment.