Barron's interview with Arvind Narayanan

Vanguard Senior Portfolio Manager, Arvind Narayanan shared insights on managing Vanguard’s Core Bond Fund, discussing the strategy, philosophy, and process in a recent interview with Barron’s.

Narayanan described how leaning into the value of diversification, smart risk-taking, and dry powder is central to how Arvind and the fund’s co-managers, Brian Quigley and Daniel Shaykevich steer the fund. For the $13.8 billion¹ Vanguard Core Bond Fund (VCORX), this has been essential to help meet investors' needs for total return and income.

Narayanan also shared Vanguard’s economic forecast, investment opportunities, the fund’s approach to sectors, yield curve, credit, and duration, and how the fund is currently positioned to weather the storm.

The Core Bond has a global team of nearly 50 researchers, and it has a wide berth to find fixed-income opportunities. Right now, the team is finding opportunities in agency mortgage-backed securities and consumer asset-backed securities.

For more on the fund managers’ perspective and Vanguard’s approach, read the full article here.

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Learn more about Vanguard's Core Bond Fund

Disclosures and Footnotes:

1 Data as of 4/30/2025.

For more information about Vanguard funds or Vanguard ETFs, visit advisors.vanguard.com or call 800-997-2798 to obtain a prospectus or, if available, a summary prospectus. Investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses, and other important information are contained in the prospectus; read and consider it carefully before investing.

All investing is subject to risk, including possible loss of principal. Bond funds are subject to the risk that an issuer will fail to make payments on time, and that bond prices will decline because of rising interest rates or negative perceptions of an issuer's ability to make payments. High-yield bonds generally have medium- and lower-range credit-quality ratings and are therefore subject to a higher level of credit risk than bonds with higher credit-quality ratings. Investments in bonds issued by non-U.S. companies are subject to risks including country/regional risk and currency risk. These risks are especially high in emerging markets. U.S. government backing of Treasury or agency securities applies only to the underlying securities and does not prevent share-price fluctuations. Unlike stocks and bonds, U.S. Treasury bills are guaranteed as to the timely payment of principal and interest. Diversification does not ensure a profit or protect against a loss.

The Morningstar Analyst Rating is not a credit or risk rating.  The Morningstar Medalist Rating is a forward-looking assessment designed to help investors evaluate the potential of investment strategies to outperform their category benchmarks after fees. The five-tier rating system combines qualitative and quantitative insights. Gold is the highest rating, reserved for investments that are expected to add the most value within their category, followed by Silver, Bronze, Neutral and Negative. Funds are evaluated on five key pillars: process, price, performance, people, and parent. A Gold rating means that the series has distinguished itself across all five pillars. It expresses an expectation that the funds, in a series as a whole, collectively will outperform their relevant performance benchmarks and/or peer groups within the context of the level of risk taken over the long term. The Silver rating applies to funds with notable advantages across several, but perhaps not all, of the five pillars - strengths that give the analysts a high level of conviction. A Bronze rating applies to funds with advantages that outweigh the disadvantages across the five pillars and with sufficient level of analyst conviction to warrant a positive rating. A Neutral rating is for funds that aren't likely to deliver standout returns but also aren't likely to significantly underperform, according to the analysts, and a Negative rating is reserved for funds that have at least one flaw likely to significantly hamper future performance and that are considered by analysts an inferior offering to their peers. 
 
 The Morningstar Analyst Rating should not be used as the sole basis in evaluating a target-date mutual fund series. This Morningstar Analyst Rating is based on Morningstar's current expectations about future events; therefore, in no way should the rating be considered as a guarantee of favorable performance. All Morningstar Analyst Ratings involve unknown risks and uncertainties, which may cause Morningstar's expectations not to occur or to differ significantly from what was expected. For additional information about the Morningstar Analyst Rating, including its methodology, visit corporate.morningstar.com.

Morningstar has awarded VCORX 4 stars based on its risk-adjusted performance compared to the 421 within the Intermediate Core Bond Morningstar category as of April 30, 2025. The Overall Morningstar Rating™ for a fund is derived from a weighted average of the performance figures associated with its 3-, 5- and 10-year (if applicable) Morningstar Rating metrics, which are based on the risk-adjusted returns, as of the date stated.

The Morningstar Rating^TM for funds, or "star rating," is calculated for managed products (including mutual funds, variable annuity and variable life subaccounts, exchange-traded funds, closed-end funds, and separate accounts) with at least a 3-year history. Exchange-traded funds and open-ended mutual funds are considered a single population for comparative purposes. It is calculated based on a Morningstar Risk-Adjusted Return measure that accounts for variation in a managed product's monthly excess performance, placing more emphasis on downward variations and rewarding consistent performance. The Morningstar Rating does not include any adjustment for sales loads. The top 10% of products in each product category receive 5 stars, the next 22.5% receive 4 stars, the next 35% receive 3 stars, the next 22.5% receive 2 stars, and the bottom 10% receive 1 star. The Overall Morningstar Rating for a managed product is derived from a weighted average of the performance figures associated with its 3-, 5-, and 10-year (if applicable) Morningstar Rating metrics. The weights are: 100% 3-year rating for 36–59 months of total returns, 60% 5-year rating/40% 3-year rating for 60–119 months of total returns, and 50% 10-year rating/30% 5-year rating/20% 3-year rating for 120 or more months of total returns. While the 10-year overall star rating formula seems to give the most weight to the 10-year period, the most recent 3-year period actually has the greatest impact because it is included in all three rating periods.

VCORX standardized performance: 1yr: 8.32%; 3yr: 2.25%; 5yr: 0.14% and since inception: 1.86% (since inception date 03/28/2016). Expense ratio 0.20% as of 04/30/2025.

The performance data shown represent past performance, which is not a guarantee of future results. Investment returns and principal value will fluctuate, so investors’ shares, when sold, may be worth more or less than their original cost. Current performance may be lower or higher than the performance data cited. For performance data current to the most recent month-end, visit our website at vanguard.com/performance.

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