Level Principal

A debt service schedule where total annual principal plus interest declines throughout the life of the bond. This entails a maturity schedule with the same amount of principal maturing each year, with a resulting smaller interest component each year. This is also called declining debt service.

Remarks: Bond funds including mutual funds (open-end and closed-end, actively managed and indexed), exchange-traded funds and unit investment trusts offer a convenient and affordable way to invest in a diversified portfolio of bonds, but a bond fund investment can differ from a bond investment in ways that are important to understand.