Current figures
| Series | Rate | Change | Struck |
|---|---|---|---|
| Australian Government 2-year | 4.940% | unchanged | 11:00 AEST · WED 7 OCT |
| Australian Government 3-year | 4.933% | +0.01 pts | 11:00 AEST · WED 7 OCT |
| Australian Government 5-year | 5.014% | +0.03 pts | 11:00 AEST · WED 7 OCT |
| Australian Government 10-year | 5.404% | +0.06 pts | 11:00 AEST · WED 7 OCT |
| Corporate A-rated · 5-year | 5.55% | +0.14 pts | 10:00 AEST · MON 31 AUG |
| Corporate BBB-rated · 5-year | 5.71% | +0.13 pts | 10:00 AEST · MON 31 AUG |
Market yields - Australian Government bonds (RBA table F2, daily) and non-financial corporate bonds (F3, monthly). These are official averages and benchmarks - not product offers, and not a comparison of providers.
What these figures are
Bond yields are market prices, not administered rates - they move daily with trading. The government-bond rows trace the yield curve from 2 to 10 years; the corporate rows show what investment-grade companies pay to borrow over five years, and the gap between them and the government curve is the market’s read on credit risk.
What the bond yields table leaves out
A yield is not the interest rate printed on a bond. The interest, called the coupon, is fixed when the bond is issued and never changes. The yield is the return implied by whatever price the bond changes hands at today, given the payments still to come and the face value repaid at maturity. That is why the two figures pull apart, and why a yield can move every day on a bond whose payments are settled for a decade.
The relationship runs in opposite directions, and the Reserve Bank’s explainer sets out why. Once a bond is issued its payments are fixed. If interest rates in the market fall, newly issued bonds offer smaller payments, which makes the older bond with its larger payments more attractive. Buyers bid its price up. But a higher price buys the same fixed payments, so the return to whoever pays it is lower: the price went up and the yield came down. Rising yields are the same mechanism running the other way, and they mean existing holders are looking at lower prices.
Buying one is a separate question from reading one. A retail investor in Australia can buy exchange-traded Australian Government Bonds at market value through a licensed broker, with brokerage payable on top. There are two kinds. Exchange-traded Treasury Bonds pay a fixed coupon; exchange-traded Treasury Indexed Bonds have a face value that is adjusted for movements in the consumer price index. Each unit has a face value of $100. What the investor holds is a CHESS Depositary Interest rather than the bond itself, and it carries the economic benefits of owning the bond, including the interest and the face value at maturity. Bonds held directly on the government’s own registry, rather than through the exchange, are a separate and unlisted holding.
Longer read: Why a long bond falls further, and what duration measures. Two bonds can face the same change in market yields and lose very different amounts of value. The property that decides how much is measurable, has a name, and is not what its name suggests.
Bond yields anchor fixed-rate pricing - see home loan rates and the RBA cash rate for the administered end of the curve.