iShares Global High Yield Corp Bond UCITS ETF

What this fund is

iShares Global High Yield Corp Bond UCITS ETF is an exchange-traded fund (ETF) from iShares, traded under the ticker HYLD (ISIN IE00B74DQ490). It lets you buy a basket of holdings in a single trade, spreading your money across them rather than one company. In plain terms it is about lending to governments and companies in return for regular interest, which tends to be steadier than shares but grows more slowly, spread broadly across markets worldwide. Its largest holdings include BLK ICS USD LEAF AGENCY DIST, MERIDIAN ARC HOLDCO LLC 144A and ECHOSTAR CORP. Spread across roughly 2033 holdings (the ten largest ≈ 3.9%), no one position makes or breaks the fund.

Its biggest country exposures are ~59.4% United States, ~7.3% France and ~7% United Kingdom. Its heaviest sectors are ~19.3% Consumer Discretionary and ~16.6% Communication Services. Funds like this are often used as the steadier, lower-swing part of a portfolio — the ballast that cushions the ups and downs of shares. Its ongoing charge (TER) is 0.5% a year — about €50 a year on a €10,000 holding, taken automatically from the fund. It is a distributing share class — dividends are paid to you as cash rather than reinvested, and over the last year it paid out roughly 5.24% (its trailing yield).

It holds the underlying investments directly (physical replication); it is domiciled in Ireland and UCITS-regulated, a European standard built to protect everyday investors and trades in USD. Its price has swung about 18% over the past year, which describes how much its price tends to move rather than whether it is good. It launched in 2012. As with any investment, its value can go down as well as up, and past performance is not a guide to future results. (Fund data sourced from iShares.)