iShares J.P. Morgan EM Corporate Bond ETF

What this fund is

iShares J.P. Morgan EM Corporate Bond ETF is an exchange-traded fund (ETF) from iShares, traded under the ticker CEMB (ISIN US4642862514). 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 across its target market.

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 holds the underlying investments directly (physical replication). Its price has swung about 3.6% over the past year — a gauge of how much the value moves, not a judgement of quality.

It launched in 2012. Like any investment, it can lose value as well as gain, and what it did before does not predict what it will do next. (Fund data sourced from iShares.)