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A golden age for convertible bonds

Key takeaways

  • Convertible bonds are income-generating investments that may offer attractive opportunities.
  • An increasing number of companies in a variety of industries are issuing convertible bonds to raise capital for their activities.
  • Investing in convertible bonds may help investors meet their goals for income, despite uncertainty around the direction of interest rates.
  • Professional investment managers have the research resources and investment expertise necessary to help identify opportunities and manage the risks associated with convertible bonds.

You probably didn’t go to sleep last night dreaming of convertible bonds. But you may have stayed awake worrying about how you can keep earning attractive yields on your portfolio if interest rates on many fixed income products come down, as some expect. That may make this a good time to look farther afield for places to put your money where it can continue to earn attractive yields.

Adam Kramer manages Fidelity® Multi-­Asset Income Fund (). He invests in a wide variety of income-oriented assets. Kramer believes there might be especially attractive opportunities in the convertible bonds that an increasing number of companies are issuing to raise capital to fund their growth and operations.

Kramer says that as of August 1, 2025, the value of the convertible bond market size is now $306 billion. "It hasn't been over $300 billion since 2020. So we finally are seeing these new issues come to market," he says.

Indeed, in the past several months, well-known names such as Nissan, DoorDash, CyberArk, and Cloudflare have all issued significant numbers of convertible bonds into the market.

What are convertible bonds?

Convertible bonds are securities that pay interest like other bonds, but which also may be converted to shares of the issuing company’s stock. The conversion of a bond to a stock may take place at a predetermined ratio of stocks per bond, which effectively results in a predetermined stock price. That means you may be able to buy a company’s convertible bond and get paid an attractive interest payment—known as a coupon—while you wait to potentially convert the bond to stock in the future. As Kramer puts it, "Convertible bonds are unique because they pay interest like other bonds but their prices also move with the issuing company’s stock."

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Why are convertible bonds attractive now?

Rick Gandhi co-manages Fidelity® Convertible Securities Fund (). He says convertibles are attractive right now not just because they can convert to shares of stock in the future. He also sees the surge in new convertible issuance as a way for individual investors to get exposure to opportunities that are being created by cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence.

One example of how convertibles have given investors exposure to the growth of Bitcoin with greater downside protection is software company MicroStrategy (), which over the last few years issued $8 billion of convertible bonds to buy Bitcoin. Kramer says, “Their convertible bonds have outperformed Bitcoin. Almost all of the convertible bonds they issued have either doubled or tripled, so they will get converted into stock. This means the company is essentially debt-free now."

Gandhi says MicroStrategy is unique because its sole purpose is to buy Bitcoin. "95% of its assets are in Bitcoin, so the company’s volatility is closely tied to the price of Bitcoin. They can issue securities with different sensitivities to the price of Bitcoin, and there is investor appetite for that. From my perspective, being a virtually debt-free company helps provide downside protection and the company has a lot of unencumbered asset value along with equity upside tied to Bitcoin,” he says.

Gandhi says that Bitcoin is also creating other opportunities in the convertible bond market. "Artificial intelligence needs a huge amount of electricity and although power consumption in the US has been flat for the last 20 years, now we're looking at a 1% to 1.5% annual growth rate in electric power demand. New power plants are hard to build but the Bitcoin miners have extra power under contract and can provide it to AI. That makes the convertible bonds that access the Bitcoin opportunity that much more attractive," he says.

Kramer notes the supply-and-demand dynamics in the convertible market also are creating opportunity. Unlike other assets, previously issued convertible bonds are continually “leaving the market” as they convert to stock and new issues with different features are taking their places. 14% of convertible bonds currently in the market will mature by 2026, and almost 20% by 2027, creating pent-up demand for new issuance.

Another benefit of convertibles is that they reduce some of the potential drawbacks of both stocks and conventional bonds. Convertible bonds generally are less sensitive than many other bonds to the risks that changes in interest rates may pose. Convertible prices can fall if interest rates rise and stock prices decline, but they are less sensitive to such changes than both stocks and traditional corporate bonds. Like other bonds, convertible prices are likely to rise when interest rates fall.

Before individual investors consider convertibles, they should remember that the convertible bond market is both small and specialized, and conditions in it can change quickly. Investors should also keep in mind that while convertible bonds may offer more predictable returns than the same issuer's stock, they also present credit risk, particularly if issued by smaller, less well-capitalized companies.

What's the future for convertible bonds?

In July, Japanese automaker Nissan made headlines by raising $1.4 billion in a convertible bond issue. The sale is significant for several reasons: One is that it shows convertibles' increasing issuance by companies, and two, that $1.4 billion is not a huge number, but it is large for the convertible market.

Small though it may be now, the convertible market is growing. “I wouldn't be surprised if convertible bonds are going to be a bigger part of the market in the next few years,” says Kramer. One of the reasons for his optimism is that more companies' leaders appear to be recognizing the helpful attributes of convertibles as tools for raising capital for an increasingly wide variety of purposes.

“I think now we've entered a golden age of convertible bonds,” says Kramer. “We're seeing some really interesting deals come to the market.”

How to invest in convertible bonds

Professional management and research can help you manage the risks that come from venturing into less-common income investments such as convertible bonds. Investors may want to consider gaining exposure to convertible bonds through multi-asset income strategies that also invest in other income assets as ways to diversify away some of the risks posed by having concentrated exposure to a single asset class. You can do this by researching professionally managed mutual funds or separately managed accounts and running screens for these products using the Mutual Fund EvaluatorETF/ETP Screener, and Stock Screener on Fidelity.com. Below are the results of some illustrative mutual fund screens that invest in convertible bonds as well as other income-generating investments (these are not recommendations of Adam Kramer or Fidelity).

Mutual funds

Fidelity® Multi-Asset Income Fund ()

Fidelity® Convertible Securities Fund ()

Invesco Convertible Securities Fund Class A ()

NYLI MacKay Convertible Class I ()

Putnam Convertible Securities Fund Class A ()

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