Bond features, pricing, yields, credit risk, and interest-rate sensitivity for Level I.
Fixed Income is a classification-and-interpretation topic before it is a formula topic. Candidates usually lose points when they confuse yield measures, misread embedded features, or forget which risk the question is actually isolating.
That is why this chapter is grouped into a few substantive lessons instead of one page per LOS. The official curriculum still defines the boundary, but the public structure is designed around how Level I candidates actually read bond questions: identify the instrument, choose the correct price or yield frame, measure rate risk, then diagnose credit or securitization features.
| Lesson | Official module coverage boundary | What to focus on |
|---|---|---|
| Bond Features, Cash Flows, and Market Structure | Fixed-Income Instrument Features; Fixed-Income Cash Flows and Types; Fixed-Income Issuance and Trading; Fixed-Income Markets for Corporate Issuers; Fixed-Income Markets for Government Issuers | Identifying the instrument, reading the indenture, understanding who benefits from the contingency, and knowing how fixed-income markets differ from equities. |
| Pricing, Yield Measures, and Term Structure | Fixed-Income Bond Valuation: Prices and Yields; Yield and Yield Spread Measures for Fixed-Rate Bonds; Yield and Yield Spread Measures for Floating-Rate Instruments; The Term Structure of Interest Rates: Spot, Par, and Forward Curves | Pricing cleanly, choosing the right yield measure, and reading spot, par, and forward relationships without mixing their jobs. |
| Duration, Convexity, and Interest Rate Risk | Interest Rate Risk and Return; Yield-Based Bond Duration Measures and Properties; Yield-Based Bond Convexity and Portfolio Properties; Curve-Based and Empirical Fixed-Income Risk Measures | How rate moves affect bond value, what each duration measure is actually telling you, and when option-adjusted or key-rate thinking matters. |
| Credit Analysis and Securitized Products | Credit Risk; Credit Analysis for Government Issuers; Credit Analysis for Corporate Issuers; Fixed-Income Securitization; ABS Instrument and Market Features; MBS Instrument and Market Features | Distinguishing credit from rate risk, using basic credit ratios correctly, and understanding why securitized cash flows behave differently from plain-vanilla bonds. |