Incredible!!! Hard for me to understand what people are thinking about. "Risk Free" investments are easy to find. In the US, simply buy United States treasuries. They are backed by the "full faith and credit" of the US goverment. The shorter the duration, the less total "yield risk" for the investor. If I were buying, I would look for 2-5 year instruments. In addition, each state in the US offers "general obligation bonds". Currently California is most attractive from a total yield standpoint. An investor wanting to buy "general obligations" bonds should buy them through a good broker who specializes in this. Always by individual issues with a date certain redemption. If I remember correctly, you can get a list of each state's initial offering of general obligations in the New York Times. Buying initial offerings you can save a little bit, because the state pays the commission. If you invest in a bond fund, you will suffer losses as the interest rate moves up later in the year. "Laddering" bonds is a valid strategy where the investor buys bonds of different durations each one a little longer than the next. Unfortunately it will not work in this environment because longer duration bonds will take a heavy hit as interest rates move up. It is a better strategy to simply buy short duration instruments periodically, keeping the balance in bank CD's. Check out Bankrate.com. Hope this has been of some help. Regards, Steve46
P.S. By the way. This is NOT investment advice. It is only my opinion based on experience.