Introducing Schwab's CD & Treasury Ladder Builder
The CD & Treasury Ladder Builder allows you to easily search, build, and purchase a laddered portfolio of CDs and Treasuries to help you meet your individual investing objectives.
On Step 1, you'll choose to begin with a predefined or custom ladder, select your account, and initial investment.
Begin by choosing if you want your ladder to be made up of CDs or Treasuries.
Next, you can select from three different predefined maturities for your ladder or choose to create your own custom ladder structure. The predefined ladders have a maturity length of 1 year, 2 years, or 5 years.
If you prefer a custom ladder structure, you may enter the years, rungs, and additional criteria to create your ladder to match your own preferences.
Once you have chosen your ladder structure, select your account and initial investment amount. Note: your initial investment amount must be divisible by the number of rungs in your ladder.
Step 2 is where you select individual investments for each rung in your ladder.
Your ladder choices from Step 1 can be found and modified in the "Your Criteria" section.
To build your ladder, check the box next to the investment that you wish to buy for that rung. You may select up to two investments per rung.
Ladders may have up to 10 selections.
The tool automatically displays the first 4 choices for each rung sorted by APY/YTM and then Maturity.
If you'd like to see additional options for this rung, click "See All Results."
Now you are seeing all possible choices for this rung and can select the investment you prefer.
There may be time where you wish to leave a rung empty. To do this, select "I choose to opt out of this rung" and you may move to the next rung.
Now that this rung is complete, you may move to the next rung and make that selection.
Continue making selections for each rung until your ladder is complete.
Step 3: Review your ladder. Before placing a trade, be sure to review your entire ladder.
Then you will have a chance to review orders and verify the accuracy of your selections.
For some CD ladders, you may choose to have your ladder rollover when each run matures.
Choose the information icon here to learn more about this feature.
When your review is complete, you are ready to begin buying each rung. Start by clicking Trade on the first rung. You will still have a chance to review each order before submitting it.
Follow the Order entry steps to enter a trade for each rung.
The Trade button will indicate when each order has been submitted.
Congratulations! All orders have been submitted and you are ready to go to Order Status and confirm your ladder is complete.
For additional resources on Bond Ladders or more about how this tool works, please see the help section on Step 1.