高收益債券基金一直是銀行熱銷的投資商品，台灣目前持有境外的高收益債券的規模約1兆台幣，依歷史資料顯示升息對高收益債券影響不大，長期持有仍有不錯的表現，因升息代表者整體的市場經濟好轉，公司違約率降低，對高收益債券來說仍是利多，適合作長期的投資與資產的配置。 本文研究發現 1.高收益債券基金長期持有的績效不佳，當年度績效好的高收益債券隔年未必會有好的績效，「擇時」投入有更好的報酬。 2.高收益債券型基金在金融市場發生波動時，相較S&P500來的抗震，隔年反彈的幅度也優於S&P500。 3.高收益債券投資的地區也會影響債券的報酬，美國高收益債券型基金報酬率沒有歐洲高收益債券型基金、亞洲高收益債券型基金來的多但波動度卻是最小的。 ;High yield bonds have been the best-seller products in commercial banks for years. Also, the total value of high yield bond funds held by Taiwan investors is around 1 trillion New Taiwan Dollar (TWD). According to historic data, the value of high yield bond does not fluctuate significantly under an interest rate hike situation. It is beneficial to high yield bonds when central bank increases interest rate, meaning that the economy is on the upward path of boom and the default possibilities of firms become lower. It seems that it is a good allocation choice to consist it in the portfolio for long-run investment strategy. There are three main conclusions made in this dissertation. Firstly, it is found that investors cannot gain positive returns absolutely through high yield bond in the long term. Investors can not earn positive returns by using momentum strategy, i.e. the top well-performed high yield bond mutual funds may not continuously outperform the bottoms. Choosing the right time to invest in high yield bonds is the most important factor for investors. Secondly, when the financial market is in fluctuations, high yield bond funds have much lower volatility than S&P 500 index. Also, the total return of high yield bond funds is higher than S&P 500 index. Thirdly, the returns of bond funds vary across country allocations. The U.S high yield bond fund has the poorest return as well as least volatility compared to Europe high yield bond and Asia high yield bond.
