Who offers the best in Bonds & Fixed Income Investing: T. Rowe Price or CPS Notes?

A prominent financial services holding company, T. Rowe Price Group, Inc. provides various kinds of investment advisory services to individual and institutional investors in the sponsored T. Rowe Price mutual funds and other investment portfolios. The Company mainly operates its investment advisory business through its subsidiary companies, T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc., T. Rowe Price International Funds, Inc. and T. Rowe Price Global Investment Services Limited. The five largest T. Rowe Price funds, as of December 31, 2006, were Equity Income, Growth Stock, Mid-Cap Growth, Blue Chip Growth and Capital Appreciation, which constituted 23% of assets under management and 27% of investment advisory revenues.

The company manages a broad range of financial products and services in the U.S as well as abroad such as domestic and international stock, bond, money market mutual funds and various other investment portfolios created to meet the growing needs of individual and institutional investors. In addition, it also provides tax-efficient and equity investment plans as well as municipal tax-free management strategies for fixed income investments.

Rowe's exclusive array of no-load mutual funds makes it highly convenient for investors to reallocate assets among funds, thus helping in significant client retention. Investors find T. Rowe highly favourable because of their comprehensive product offerings and freedom from regulatory issues. All T. Rowe's funds are no-load or sold without a sales commission. The different types of funds provided by T. Rowe Price include Taxable Bond Funds, Tax-Free Bond Funds and Money Market Funds. T. Rowe provide mutual funds which use a variety of investment styles, including growth, value, sector-focused, tax-efficient, and quantitative index-oriented approaches.

Consumer Portfolio Services, Inc. is a specialized consumer finance company which focuses on purchasing, securitizing and servicing motor vehicle retail instalment contracts of franchised and select independent automobile dealerships in the United States. Customers can earn high annual yields by investing in renewable unsecured subordinated notes issued by Consumer Portfolio Services.

A renewable unsecured subordinated note could be referred to as a promise to pay the principal and interest on the note to the holder by Consumer Portfolio Services, Inc. Purchasing a note means that the customer is lending money to CPS. The note is representative of the company's financial obligation to repay the loan with interest. Upon the maturity of the loan, the customer can choose repayment of the note. The investment will be returned to him/her along with any accrued but unpaid interest. In case, neither the customer nor CPS chooses to repay the note at maturity, the note automatically gets renewed for another period and continues to earn interest. CPS notes have maturity terms which range from three months to ten years. Interest rates are calculated from the time a note is purchased or renewed up to the term of its maturity and is based on the aggregate principal amount of all CPS notes owned by the customer and his closest family members. The notes earn significantly higher interest rates when the aggregate principal amount reaches $25,000, $50,000, $75,000 and $100,000.

Nayanathara. S.

Hi-Tech Editorial Division