Day 1,575: punter, t-bills, short-dated Treasury accounts, money-market fund

When treasury bonds (or t-bills) last yielded as much as they do today—5.5%—punters were relieved that the world had not been destroyed by the millennium bug, Destiny’s Child were atop the charts and the dotcom bubble was going strong.

As with retail short-dated Treasury accounts, money-market funds are attractive to savers because they are highly liquid, meaning that cash can be withdrawn quickly if required.

Retail investors have a surprising new favourite: Treasury bills

Artwork of the day 
Gamblers
Pavel Fedotov
Date: 1852
Style: Realism
Genre: genre painting
Media: oil, canvas
Location: Museum of Russian Art (Tereshchenko Museum), Kyiv, Ukraine
Dimensions: 60.5 x 70.2 cm

Word of the day 
punter: a person who gambles (= risks money guessing the result of something)
money-market fund: a kind of mutual fund that invests in highly liquid, near-term instruments 

Quote of the day
“What a rotten shilling punter!" said Bramble, tearing her bread to bits. "I can't believe he stole our things! Especially the watch! We stole that watch first, fair and square!”

― Heather Dixon, Entwined