Bond Duration
Categories: Bonds, Muni Bonds
Duration refers to the length of time from when a loan is made to when it is paid off. It can also refer to the length of time until a bond matures. Some bonds are very high duration (Disney has issued 100-year bonds) while most others are much, much shorter in duration.
Loans with a long duration will reflect prices that are much more volatile than bonds that come due in a few years. Over a 100-year period, you'd imagine that bond prices would be affected greatly by inflation, credit risk worries, and individual corporate issues, all of which make prices in bond swings volatile for high duration bonds.