SGS Bonds in Singapore: Today's Yields, How to Buy and How They Compare with SSBs

SGS bonds are Singapore Government Securities that pay a fixed coupon every six months and return your capital at maturity, with tenors from 2 to 50 years. As of early November 2026 they yield about 1.9% for two years and 2.0–2.3% from five to 30 years. You can buy them at MAS auctions from S$1,000 with cash, SRS or CPF savings, or on the secondary market.

The main difference from Singapore Savings Bonds is that SGS bonds are tradable: there is no cap on how much you can hold and you can sell at any time, but the price moves with interest rates. Right now that trade-off matters more than usual, because a December 2026 Savings Bond pays a higher 10-year average return than a 10-year SGS bond. This guide covers what you actually earn, how an auction works, where CPF and SRS rules bite, and when SGS bonds are the better choice.

What are SGS bonds?

SGS bonds are tradable debt securities issued by the Singapore Government, rated AAA, paying a fixed coupon twice a year until maturity. They come in seven standard tenors: 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 and 50 years. Individuals and non-residents can buy them at auction or on the secondary market, in multiples of S$1,000.

Unlike Singapore Savings Bonds, SGS bonds cannot be redeemed early at face value. If you need your money before maturity, you sell the bond at the market price, which can be above or below what you paid. Unlike Treasury bills, which run six months or one year and pay no coupon, SGS bonds lock in a rate for years and pay you income along the way.

You need a bank account with DBS/POSB, OCBC or UOB and an individual CDP account with Direct Crediting Service to buy with cash. Joint CDP accounts are not accepted, although you can pay from a joint bank account.

Market Development, Infrastructure and Green bonds

There are three categories, and they differ in what the money is used for and the law they are issued under, not in credit risk.

For an individual investor the choice between categories rarely matters. What matters is the tenor, the yield at which you buy and whether you will hold to maturity.

SGS bond yields today (November 2026)

Benchmark SGS yields sit in a narrow band: about 1.86% for two years, 2.03% for five years and 2.24–2.28% from 10 to 30 years, based on secondary-market closes on 30 October to 2 November 2026. The curve is unusually flat, so locking in for 30 years pays only about 0.4 percentage points more than two years.

The most recent auction was a new 5-year bond (N526100H) on 28 October 2026. It cleared at a cut-off yield of 2.09%, a little above the secondary-market level, and was issued on 2 November with a 2.000% coupon. For comparison, the 6-month T-bill cut off at 1.95% on 22 October 2026.

Coupon vs yield: what you actually earn

The coupon is the fixed cash you receive; the yield is your actual annual return, which depends on the price you paid. MAS sets a new bond's coupon by rounding the auction cut-off yield down to the nearest 0.125%, so new bonds are usually issued slightly below face value.

The October 2026 auction shows how this works. The cut-off yield of 2.09% was rounded down to a 2.000% coupon, so successful bidders paid 99.575% of face value. On S$10,000 of bonds you would pay S$9,957.50, receive S$100 in coupons every six months, and get S$10,000 back on 1 November 2031. The S$42.50 discount is the part of your return that tops the coupon up to 2.09% a year.

On a reopened bond, the coupon is the one set when the bond first came out, so it can be far from today's yields. If the coupon is higher than the auction yield you pay more than face value; if it is lower you pay less. Either way, the yield to maturity is the number to compare with other options, not the coupon.

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SGS bonds vs SSBs vs T-bills: which pays more now

For a 10-year hold of up to S$200,000, the December 2026 Savings Bond currently pays more than a 10-year SGS bond (2.39% average a year against 2.24%) and carries no price risk. SGS bonds win when you need to invest more than the SSB cap, want a fixed rate for longer than 10 years, or want a bond you can sell at a market price.

On S$100,000, the gap between the Savings Bond's 2.39% average and the 10-year SGS bond's 2.24% is about S$150 a year in the Savings Bond's favour, before you count the option to redeem at par. That gap moves every month, because SSB rates are set from SGS yields of the previous month and the SGS market reprices daily.

Choose SGS bonds if:

• you have more than S$200,000 to place in government bonds, or your SSB allocation is already full
• you want to fix a rate for 15, 20 or 30 years, for example to match a known future spending need
• you want income from CPF-OA or CPF-SA savings, where SSBs are not allowed (see the CPF section before doing this)
• you may want to sell before maturity and accept that the price can be below what you paid

Choose Savings Bonds if you are investing under the cap, want access to your money at face value, or are unsure how long you will hold. Choose T-bills, or a money market fund, for money you need within a year.

Kilde's view. For most individuals placing less than S$200,000, Savings Bonds currently do the job of a 10-year SGS bond with less risk and a slightly higher average return. SGS bonds earn their place at the edges: amounts above the cap, horizons beyond 10 years, and investors who want a tradable bond. In a flat curve like today's, buying long tenors mostly adds price risk rather than income.

How to buy SGS bonds

You buy new SGS bonds by bidding at an MAS auction through DBS/POSB, OCBC or UOB, in multiples of S$1,000. Cash bids go through ATMs or internet banking and usually close one business day before the auction; CPF bids close earlier and some must be made at a branch. Results come out the same day and bonds are issued three business days later.

Cash, SRS and CPF: channels, deadlines and fees

For a new issue the full bid amount is taken from your account when you apply, and the discount is refunded after the auction. For a reopened bond, 115% of the bid is taken up front because the price is only known after the auction; the difference is refunded or debited afterwards. If your bid fails, the money comes back within one to two business days.

How SGS auctions work: competitive vs non-competitive bids

SGS auctions are uniform-price: every successful bidder pays the same price, set by the highest yield accepted, called the cut-off yield. A non-competitive bid states only an amount and is filled first, up to 40% of the issue. A competitive bid states the lowest yield you will accept; bids at or below the cut-off are filled.

The 28 October 2026 auction of the 5-year bond shows what each choice would have meant:

A non-competitive bid for S$10,000 would have been filled in full at 2.09%. A competitive bid at 2.05% would also have been filled in full at 2.09%, because everyone gets the cut-off yield. A bid at 2.09% would have received about 57% of the amount asked for, and a bid at 2.10% would have received nothing.

For most individuals a non-competitive bid is the sensible default: you get the market-clearing yield without risking missing out. Competitive bids make sense only if you would rather not buy at all below a certain yield. Individuals can be allotted up to S$2 million in non-competitive bids per SGS bond auction and up to 15% of the issue in total, and banks may set lower online limits; DBS, for example, caps online applications at S$1 million.

Upcoming SGS bond auctions

MAS publishes the following year's issuance calendar each October or November, and announces each auction four business days before it is held. In 2026 there were bond auctions roughly monthly, rotating through tenors: the latest were the 10-year in August, the 15-year in September and the 5-year in October, plus a 20-year green bond sold by syndication in July. Check the MAS issuance calendar for the next date and the 2027 schedule.

Using CPF and SRS for SGS bonds

You can buy SGS bonds with CPF savings above the first S$20,000 in your Ordinary Account or the first S$40,000 in your Special Account, and with SRS funds. Whether it makes sense depends on the rate you give up: OA savings earn 2.5% and SA savings at least 4%, both above every SGS yield today.

CPF OA: when it beats leaving the money in OA

With the 10-year SGS bond at 2.24% and the OA paying 2.5%, moving OA savings into SGS bonds currently lowers your return. On S$10,000 the yield gap alone costs about S$26 a year. Through DBS, the CPF-OA fees add roughly S$93 over 10 years, or about S$9 a year: purchase and maturity charges plus a quarterly holding charge.

That puts the break-even yield at roughly 2.6% for S$10,000 held for 10 years, before counting the price risk if you sell early. On S$100,000 the fixed fees matter less and the break-even falls to just above 2.5%. Even then the CPF Board points out that you can lose capital if you sell before maturity. For SA savings, which earn at least 4%, SGS bonds make little sense at current yields. See our guide to CPF interest rates for the current account rates and how the extra interest works.

Kilde's view. The OA rate is a risk-free hurdle that is easy to forget because it does not show up as a quote anywhere. Until SGS yields clear it by more than the fees, leaving the money in your OA is the better government-backed option, and the CPF Investment Scheme is better kept for assets with a reason to beat 2.5%.

SRS

SRS is where SGS bonds make most sense for retirement savings. Uninvested SRS cash earns very little, around 0.05% at DBS, so a bond yielding 2% or more is a clear improvement, and Savings Bonds are also allowed. You apply through your SRS operator's internet banking. Coupons and the principal at maturity go back into your SRS account. Our SRS account guide covers the tax relief and withdrawal rules.

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Selling before maturity: prices, liquidity and interest-rate risk

You can sell SGS bonds at any time through DBS, OCBC or UOB, or on SGX through a broker, but you get the market price, not face value. Bond prices fall when yields rise, and the longer the bond, the bigger the move. If you hold to maturity you receive the full face value regardless.

How much can an SGS bond fall?

The table estimates how the price of a bond bought at face value today would change if yields moved by one percentage point straight away. It uses current yields as coupons and standard semi-annual bond maths.

A one-point rise in yields would wipe out about four years of coupons on a 10-year bond, and more than eight years of coupons on a 30-year bond, if you had to sell.

This is not hypothetical. The 30-year bond NA21200W was auctioned in September 2021 with a 1.875% coupon at a price of 98.303. At today's 30-year yield of about 2.27%, a bond with that coupon and 25 years left would be worth roughly 92.5. An investor who bought at issue and sold now would be about 6% down on price, offset by around five years of coupons received, about 9.4% of face value.

Where to check prices and how to sell

MAS publishes daily closing prices and yields for SGS bonds on its statistics pages, and SGX shows retail quotes for listed issues. To sell, use your bank (UOB, for example, buys and sells SGS for customers on the secondary market) or place an order on SGX through a broker; bonds bought with cash sit in your CDP account. Trading volumes in individual retail lots can be thin, so check the bid price and any brokerage fee before you sell.

Are SGS bond coupons taxable?

No, not for individuals. Interest on SGS is tax-exempt for individuals under the Qualifying Debt Securities scheme, so coupons do not need to be declared. Singapore does not tax capital gains, so a gain from selling a bond above your purchase price is normally not taxed either, unless IRAS treats your activity as trading.

SGS bond ETFs and funds

If you want government bond exposure without picking tenors or bidding at auctions, a Singapore bond index ETF is the alternative. The ABF Singapore Bond Index Fund (SGX: A35) holds mainly SGS and quasi-government bonds and trades like a share; our guide to buying ETFs in Singapore covers the brokerage side. You give up the fixed maturity date: an ETF never matures, so its price risk does not fall away over time the way a single bond's does.

Bond ETFs suit investors who want diversification across many maturities and the ability to buy small amounts at any time. Single SGS bonds suit investors who want a known cash flow and a known end date. Our guide to investing in bonds in Singapore compares SGX bond ETFs, their fees and how to buy them.

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Where SGS bonds fit in a fixed-income portfolio

SGS bonds are the risk-free anchor of a Singapore-dollar portfolio: the yield you can earn without taking credit risk. Every other fixed-income product, from bank deposits to corporate bonds and private credit, is priced as a premium over that anchor. Knowing the SGS yield for a given tenor tells you how much extra you are being paid, and for what.

A simple way to use SGS bonds is a ladder: split the money across several maturities, such as 2, 5 and 10 years, so part of it comes due every few years and can be reinvested at the rates prevailing then. A ladder reduces the risk of locking everything in at a low point and limits how much you would ever need to sell early. Our guide to fixed income in Singapore shows how SGS, T-bills, deposits, funds and credit products line up on yield and risk.

Kilde's view. Treat the SGS curve as the yardstick for everything else you hold. When a 10-year government bond pays about 2.2%, any product offering more is paying you to take credit risk, give up liquidity, or both. That premium can be worth earning, but only if you understand how the borrower repays, what happens if it does not, and how long your money is committed. For accredited investors considering private credit, the useful question is not the headline yield but the spread over SGS and what risks it pays for.

Who SGS bonds suit, and who they don't

SGS bonds suit investors who want a fixed Singapore-dollar income for a known period, backed by the government, and who can hold to maturity or accept price swings. They suit less well anyone who may need the money at short notice, investors with room left under the SSB cap, and CPF savings while the OA and SA rates are higher.

SGS bonds are a good fit if you:

• have more than S$200,000 for government bonds, or have used your SSB allocation
• want to lock in a rate for longer than 10 years
• invest through SRS and want more than the SRS cash rate
• plan to hold to maturity, or are comfortable selling at a market price

They are a poor fit if you:

• may need the money within a year or two at a known value (consider Savings Bonds or T-bills)
• would fund them from CPF-OA or CPF-SA at today's yields
• want more than government yields and accept more risk (see the options in our guide to safe and low-risk investments)

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