Junk I own:
PRCPX. +3.33%. YTD
TUHYX. +4.52%
HYDB. +1.14%
****************
YTD is a long way from 5 years. But there are the dividends in the meantime. If rates stand still or come down, junk will do OK at the very least, along with a stock recovery. I'm always fully invested. The cash I hold is held in the funds I own. I'm aware of 5% CD rates. The mechanics of initiating such accounts is the bugga-boo for me.
...And of course, my own mileage certainly HAS varied---- by a huge amount--- to the downside in TUHYX. At least I'm "in the black" with the other two.

@stillers, you seem to have quite an anger problem. Bottom line is I never once said a CD ladder wasn't a good idea. I tried to covey that bond funds also may be turning the corner and starting to give decent returns - for anyone who chooses that investment path. Even at your dismay and scorn.

Ah, c'mon man!
If I really had an anger problem and dealt in scorn, I'd ask you if you think the Bills will EVER win a Super Bowl! Or even ever get there again and, well, lose again!
And I'd be sure to give you 0:13 to reply, make sure all your players have their helmets, and warn you about drifting too far to the right!
My only purpose on this thread was to point up that bond fund investors generally seek 4%-5% TRs. And that those rates of return are currently available in non-callable CDs, with higher rates having been available at the peak.
Also, many investors don't seem to understand that those incredibly unsexy CDs are there for the taking, if they could only get out of their own way.
So while bond fund investors over the next 5 years will be putting in time and effort trying to get their 4%-5% TRs, I'll be putting on a slew of golf courses, knowing that we have a 5+-yr CD ladder in place of those bond funds that is paying in excess of 5%.
No need for anyone to read that again s-l-o-w-l-y, unless of course you still don't get it.
BTW, I NEVER stated that CDs were the only option. But hey, it's the internet, so feel free to parrot it over-and-over-and-over again and it will become a fact (to some/most).

I owned BAMBIX through most of 2022 (10% weighting). There’s a great thread on it somewhere in the 2021 or 2022 archives. Sold it to move into a more aggressive 40/60 conservative allocation fund after markets fell so much in ‘22. But I keep it in mind as a potential defensive holding. The manager (Jeff Rosenberg?) appears quite often on Bloomberg TV and certainly makes a good impression. I get the feeling BAMBX and some others in the league feel they can earn their pay if they deliver a percent or two better than MM / short-term bond funds - which I suspect they’ll manage to do over time. Yet, when you look at the ERs on them it makes you shake your head.

A lot of this spring’s US regional banking crisis can be explained this way:

• 1) Banks bought a lot of Treasury bonds and other US government-backed securities when interest rates were low, paying roughly 100 cents on the dollar for them.
• 2) Interest rates went up a lot, driving the prices of those bonds down to, say, 85 cents on the dollar.
• 3) Banks had big losses on those bonds, eating through a lot of their capital.
• 4) People noticed, stocks went down, deposits fled, some banks failed and others have looked shaky.

One solution to this crisis would be that, if the bonds magically went back to being worth 100 cents on the dollar, the banks would mostly be fine again. That seems improbable, though I guess one interesting mechanism would be if the banking crisis caused enough of a recession to drive long-term interest rates back to where they were in 2020. Then the bonds would be fine, though probably the banks would have credit losses.
Another solution to this crisis would be that, if the US government just bought the bonds from the banks at 100 cents on the dollar, the banks would mostly be fine again. Of course then the government would have paid 100 cents for stuff worth 85 cents, which seems bad. But through the magic of held-to-maturity accounting, you can sort of wave your hands and pretend that it’s not bad. If the government paid 100 cents today for a bond worth 85 cents, and then held it until it matured, it would get back 100 cents. (Plus interest, though not very much.) In some accounting sense, the government would not lose any money: It would get a below-market rate of interest on its money for the next few years, but it would technically get all of its money back.
And in fact this is kind of how the banks thought of these bonds: They were often in the banks’ held-to-maturity portfolios, meaning that they didn’t need to be marked down when they lost value due to changing interest rates. It’s just that, when people notice this stuff and deposits flee, you can’t hold the bonds to maturity, because you have to sell them, at a loss, to pay back depositors. But the government is not funded by short-term deposits, so it really can hold the bonds to maturity.
And in fact this is kind of, a little bit, a solution that the government hit on: In response to the failure of Silicon Valley Bank, the US Federal Reserve announced a new Bank Term Funding Program that would lend the banks 100 cents on the dollar against bonds worth 85 cents on the dollar. This is not the same thing as buying the bonds at 100 cents on the dollar — the banks, rather than the government, are still economically on the hook for the losses — but it is motivated by the same sort of thinking. “Eventually these bonds will pay out 100 cents on the dollar, so it’s fine to lend 100 cents on the dollar against them, even if they are worth 85 cents today.”
But nobody has actually embraced a program of “the government will just buy the bonds back at par to make the banks healthy again,” because it is kind of an extreme transfer of losses from banks to taxpayers, even if you can wave your hands a bit and pretend it isn’t. But here’s this from Andrew Ackerman at the Wall Street Journal:

Banks have spent the past week or so testing what would be a clever gambit: Paying billions of dollars they collectively owe to replenish a federal deposit insurance fund using Treasurys instead of cash.
The idea—floated to regulators and lawmakers by PNC Financial Services Group and supported by others—could allow banks to take securities that are currently worth, say, 90 cents on the dollar, and give them to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. at full price. That would effectively shift losses clogging the banks’ balance sheets to the FDIC, according to people familiar with the proposal. ...
Proponents say nothing in the law says FDIC fees have to be paid in cash, so the agency could change its rules. They say the move, if greenlighted by the FDIC, would help the banking system address the way rising rates over the past year have saddled lenders with billions in losses on their portfolios of bonds. Those losses helped sink Silicon Valley Bank in March, sparking turmoil across the banking sector. …
Supporters say the government would hold the securities until maturity, allowing them to recover principal and interest on the debt. The government would suffer no losses, they say.

The FDIC has spent billions of dollars on its bank rescues — which is also a transfer of losses from banks to the government to make the banking system more solvent — but it is getting the money back by charging a special assessment to be paid by about 113 big banks. If the banks pay the assessment with Treasuries that are worth 90 cents on the dollar, but that count for 100 cents on the dollar, then they get a little discount on the assessment and get to move unpleasant assets off their balance sheets.
Why stop there? They should pay their taxes in Treasuries. Really what they should do is pay executive bonuses in Treasuries: “We’re giving you a $1 million bonus, technically it is only worth $850,000 but if you hold it to maturity it’s a million.”

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1110502/000158064223002777/hussman-sif_497e.htm
497 1 hussman-sif_497e.htm 497
A close up of a logo
Description automatically generated with low confidence
May 18, 2023
HUSSMAN INVESTMENT TRUST
HUSSMAN STRATEGIC INTERNATIONAL FUND
Supplement to the Prospectus dated November 1, 2022, as amended
Effective immediately, Hussman Strategic International Fund (the “Fund”), a series of Hussman Investment Trust (the “Trust”), is terminating the public offering of its shares. Shares of the Fund are therefore no longer available for purchase by investors. As discussed below, all outstanding shares of the Fund will be redeemed at their net asset value per share determined as of the close of business on June 27, 2023 (the “Redemption Date”).
The return of capital by way of a redemption of all outstanding shares of the Fund was approved by the Board of Trustees of the Trust (the “Board”) based on the Board’s determination, in consultation with the Fund’s investment adviser, Hussman Strategic Advisors, Inc. (the “Adviser”), that failure to redeem all shares could have materially adverse consequences to the Fund and its shareholders given relevant factors including the Fund’s small asset base and limited prospects for the Fund to reduce expenses and increase cost efficiencies based on assets from new shareholder investments. Through the Redemption Date, the Adviser will continue to reduce its fees and to reimburse expenses of the Fund as necessary to limit the ordinary operating expenses of the Fund to 2.00% annually of the Fund’s average daily net assets (as described in the Prospectus).
All shares of the Fund will be redeemed on the Redemption Date, and the proceeds of the redemption of shares held in each shareholder’s account will be sent to the shareholder’s address of record or to such other address as may be directed by the shareholder, including special instructions that may be needed for Individual Retirement Accounts (“IRAs”) and other tax deferred retirement accounts (as discussed below). Between the date of this Supplement and the Redemption Date, the portfolio securities of the Fund will be sold in an orderly manner as necessary to satisfy redemption requests and to effect redemptions of shares on the Redemption Date. This liquidation of the Fund’s portfolio holdings will reduce, and eventually eliminate, the Fund’s normal exposure to foreign equity investments. Accordingly, during the liquidation process through the Redemption Date, the Fund will not be pursuing its stated investment objective.
Shareholders continue to have the right to redeem their Fund shares or to exchange those shares for shares of any of the other Hussman funds on each business day prior to the Redemption Date. Redemptions (including the redemption of shares in connection with an exchange) will be processed at the net asset value per share of the Fund next computed after receipt of the redemption or exchange request. Shareholders wishing to exchange their shares of the Fund for shares of another Hussman fund should obtain and read carefully the prospectus of the Hussman fund into which they wish to exchange shares before submitting an exchange request.*
The redemption of shares of the Fund, and the exchange of shares of the Fund for shares of another Hussman fund, as described in this Supplement, will each for tax purposes be considered a sale of your Fund shares. Shareholders should consult with their own tax advisors to ensure proper treatment of the redemption or exchange on their income tax returns. In addition, shareholders invested in the Fund through an IRA or other tax-deferred retirement account should consult the rules regarding reinvestment of their redemption proceeds. In order to avoid the taxation of redemption proceeds in the current tax year, such shareholder may choose to authorize, prior to the Redemption Date, a direct transfer of their retirement account assets invested in the Fund to another IRA or tax-deferred retirement account. Generally, a shareholder will have 60 days from the Redemption Date to invest their redemption proceeds in another IRA or tax-deferred retirement account to avoid treatment of the redemption proceeds as taxable income for the current tax year.
If you have any questions regarding your investment, or the redemption or exchange of Fund shares as described in this Supplement, please call 1-800-487-7626.
Investors Should Retain this Supplement for Future Reference
*Before deciding whether to exchange your shares of the Fund for shares of another Hussman fund, you should consider carefully the investment objective, risks, and charges and expenses of the other fund. The prospectuses for the Hussman funds are available at www.hussmanfunds.com or can be obtained by calling 1-800-487-7626. Please read the applicable prospectus carefully before investing. Purchases of shares of a fund acquired by means of an exchange will be effected at the net asset value of that fund next determined after receipt of your exchange request.

im thinking about selling BAMBX and buying fidelity money market fund SPAAX. as of 5/18/23 bambx is only up .11% while spaax is up 1.62%. this money is in a non retirement account. im looking for saftey of principle but i would also like to make a little return on my money. im not used to seeing this kind of a return on a money market fund and i dont know how long it can last.

Only m-mkt funds and T-Bills are "cash" alternatives. No other fund, including the ultra-ST bond funds, can formally serve that purpose.
But many posters do use ultra-ST and short-terms bond funds for liquidity. I was surprised that several ST bond funds in 2022 (possibly the worst year for bonds) had drawdowns of -10% vs -5% that could be expected.

AAII Sentiment Survey, 5/17/23
For the week ending on 5/17/23, bearish remained the top sentiment (39.7%; above average) & bullish remained the bottom sentiment (22.9%; low); neutral remained the middle sentiment (37.4%; above average); Bull-Bear Spread was -16.8% (low). Investor concerns: Inflation (moderating but high); economy; the Fed; dollar; crypto regulations; market volatility (VIX, VXN, MOVE); Russia-Ukraine war (64+ weeks, 2/24/22- ); geopolitical. For the Survey week (Th-Wed), stocks were mixed, bonds down, oil up, gold down, dollar up. The debt-ceiling issue must be resolved by 6/1/23. The regional banking crisis continues. #AAII #Sentiment #Markets
https://ybbpersonalfinance.proboards.com/post/1040/thread

Per WSJ this evening ... read what you will into it.....

"Schwab Taps Credit Markets To Raise $2.5 Billion In Debt"
Schwab issued $1.2 billion of bonds due in 2029 and $1.3 billion of bonds due in 2034, according to a person familiar with the matter. The bonds due in 2029 were issued at a 5.643% yield, or 2.05 percentage point higher than U.S. Treasurys, while the notes due in 2034 were sold at a 5.853% yield or 2.27 percentage point spread.
By comparison, the company sold 10-year bonds a little more than a year ago at a yield of around 2.9%.
In its filing, Schwab said it would use the proceeds for general corporate purposes, including “investments in our subsidiaries and supporting business growth.” A Schwab spokeswoman declined to comment.
< - >
https://www.wsj.com/articles/schwab-taps-credit-markets-to-raise-2-5-billion-in-debt-97dd0ef8?mod=hp_listb_pos1

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1261788/000089418923003762/zieglerseniorfloatingratef.htm
497 1 zieglerseniorfloatingratef.htm 497E ZIEGLER SENIOR FLOATING RATE FUND LIQUIDATION
Trust for Advised Portfolios
Supplement dated May 17, 2023
to the Prospectus and Statement of Additional Information
dated January 31, 2023 for the
Ziegler Senior Floating Rate Fund
Ziegler Capital Management, LLC (“ZCM”), investment adviser to Ziegler Senior Floating Rate Fund (the “Fund”), has recommended, and the Board of Trustees of the Trust for Advised Portfolios has approved, the liquidation and termination of the Fund. The Fund is expected to cease operations and liquidate on or about July 16, 2023 (the “Liquidation Date”). On or promptly after the Liquidation Date, the Fund will make a liquidating distribution to its remaining shareholders equal to each shareholder’s proportionate interest in the net assets of the Fund, in complete redemption and cancellation of the Fund’s shares held by the shareholder, and the Fund will be dissolved.
Effective at the close of business on May 22, 2023, the Fund will no longer accept purchase orders. In addition, beginning at the close of business on May 17, 2023, ZCM will begin an orderly liquidation of the Fund’s assets and the Fund’s assets will be converted into cash and cash equivalents. As a result, during this process, the Fund will no longer be pursuing its stated investment objective. Although the Fund will be closed to new investments as of the close of business on May 22, 2023, shareholders may voluntarily redeem their shares before the Liquidation Date. Shares of the Fund redeemed on or after July 16, 2023 will not be subject to redemption fees. ZCM will bear all expenses incurred in carrying out the liquidation process, except for transaction costs incurred in connection with liquidating the Fund’s investments. Shareholders remaining in the Fund just prior to the Liquidation Date may bear increased transaction fees incurred in connection with the disposition of the Fund’s portfolio holdings.
The liquidating distribution will include any accrued income and capital gains, will be treated as a payment in exchange for shares, and will generally be a taxable event for shareholders investing through taxable accounts. You should consult with your tax advisor for further information regarding the federal, state and/or local income tax consequences of the liquidation that are relevant to your specific situation.
Please contact the Fund at 833-777-1533 or your financial advisor if you have questions or need assistance.
Please retain this supplement with your Prospectus and Statement of Additional Information for future reference.

Still use a real human professional. That 1040 makes my head hurt. And now, for what it's worth, there's the K-1. (First time for that was for the '22 tax year.)

+1

RiverPark Strategic Income Fund now advised by CrossingBridge Advisors. The transaction between RiverPark, Cohanzick, and CrossingBridge closed the transaction as disclosed in ENDI Corp 10Q under subsequent events. CrossingBridge Advisors in 100% wholly-owned by ENDI Corp (OTCBB: ENDI) in which David Sherman is deemed a controlling shareholder.
https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1908984/000143774923014518/endi20230331_10q.htm

Great comments from everyone.
For the reason of being state tax exempt, we invest in treasury over CDs in taxable account. Additionally, we like the liquidity aspect that enable selling treasury before maturity in secondary market, whereas brokered CDs do not share the same level of flexibility. Selling bank CDs before maturity date would face with stiff penalties ( losing several months of interest).
Speaking of bonds and bond funds, our MFO contributor, Lynn Bolin provided a very nice article in April 2023’s commentary. Enjoy.
https://mutualfundobserver.com/2023/04/bond-funds-for-a-recession-and-falling-rates/#more-17875

I have read that in case of no/delayed debt-ceiling resolution, the T-Bill may hit 8-10%. Just imagine the mark-to-market (MTM) chaos that will cause for m-mkt funds, bank capital, loan collaterals. May be the government will declare some MTM holidays in the US, but will the global markets pay attention? Institutions live on MTM (and that is where some panic is - weird Treasury yield-curve, high CDS on the US sovereign debt), but retail doesn't. T-Bills should be money-good at maturity.

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1314414/000158064223002742/psi_497.htm
497 1 psi_497.htm 497
PSI STRATEGIC GROWTH FUND
Class A Shares FXSAX
(a series of Northern Lights Fund Trust)
Supplement dated May 16, 2023 to
the Prospectus dated October 28, 2022
The Board of Trustees of Northern Lights Fund Trust (the “Board”) has determined based on the recommendation of the investment adviser of the Portfolio Strategies, Inc. (the “Fund”), that it is in the best interests of the Fund and its shareholders that the Fund cease operations. The Board has determined to close the Fund and redeem all outstanding shares on June 27, 2023.
Effective at the close of business May 16, 2023, the Fund will not accept any purchases and will no longer pursue their stated investment objectives. The Fund may begin liquidating its portfolio and may invest in cash equivalents such as money market funds until all shares have been redeemed. Any capital gains will be distributed as soon as practicable to shareholders. Shares of the Fund are otherwise not available for purchase.
Prior to June 27, 2023, you may redeem your shares, including reinvested distributions, in accordance with the “How to Redeem Shares” section in the Prospectus. Unless your investment in the Fund is through a tax-deferred retirement account, a redemption is subject to tax on any taxable gains. Please refer to the “Tax Status, Dividends and Distributions” section in the Prospectus for general information. You may wish to consult your tax advisor about your particular situation.
ANY SHAREHOLDERS WHO HAVE NOT REDEEMED THEIR SHARES OF THE FUND PRIOR TO June 27, 2023 WILL HAVE THEIR SHARES AUTOMATICALLY REDEEMED AS OF THAT DATE, AND PROCEEDS WILL BE SENT TO THE ADDRESS OF RECORD. IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS OR NEED ASSISTANCE, PLEASE CONTACT YOUR FINANCIAL ADVISOR DIRECTLY OR THE FUND AT 1-888-9-BUYPSI.
IMPORTANT INFORMATION FOR RETIREMENT PLAN INVESTORS
If you are a retirement plan investor, you should consult your tax advisor regarding the consequences of a redemption of Fund shares. If you receive a distribution from an Individual Retirement Account or a Simplified Employee Pension (SEP) IRA, you must roll the proceeds into another Individual Retirement Account within sixty (60) days of the date of the distribution in order to avoid having to include the distribution in your taxable income for the year. If you receive a distribution from a 403(b)(7) Custodian Account (Tax-Sheltered account) or a Keogh Account, you must roll the distribution into a similar type of retirement plan within sixty (60) days in order to avoid disqualification of your plan and the severe tax consequences that it can bring. If you are the trustee of a Qualified Retirement Plan, you may reinvest the money in any way permitted by the plan and trust agreement.
This Supplement and the existing Prospectus dated October 28, 2022, provide relevant information for all shareholders and should be retained for future reference. Both the Prospectus and the Statement of Additional Information dated October 28, 2022, have been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, are incorporated by reference and can be obtained without charge by calling the Fund at 1-888-9-BUYPSI.

The 2019 ProPublica piece is out of date.

The IRS announced significant changes Monday [Dec 30, 2019] to its deal with the tax prep software industry. Now companies are barred from hiding their free products from search engines [as reported in the ProPublica piece] such as Google, and a years-old prohibition on the IRS creating its own online filing system has been scrapped.

https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2020/01/irs-reforms-free-file-program-drops-agreement-not-compete-turbotax/162167/
Intuit did itself no favors by hiding the free software from users. Instead of living with half a loaf, it could wind up with crumbs. It, and H&R Block, shot themselves in the foot by going further and completely dropping out of the Free File program in 2021 and 2020 respectively.
https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-maker-intuit-will-leave-free-tax-filing-partnership-with-irs
From that piece:

The program was founded as a gambit by the tax prep industry, led by Intuit, after the George W. Bush administration proposed that the IRS create a free online filing option for taxpayers.

Worth noting who made the original proposal, given that

Republicans are already lining up against the plan, fearing it could eventually lead to a system where the IRS fills out people’s returns for them, which they say is a conflict of interest since the agency also enforces tax laws.

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/16/irs-free-online-filing-system-00097198
Why haven't I seen lots of homeowners up in arms about their municipal government determining how much their property is worth (assessor), then based on that number calculating how much they owe in property taxes, and even collecting the taxes online. And if you don't pay, they'll send the county sheriff to arrest you, the city attorney to prosecute you, and the municipal court to try you.
Certainly those must be blatant conflicts of interest as well. I protest! :-)

[snip]
BTW, IRS is setting up online tax filing for free. If they can make the user interface similar to that ofTurboTax, that would be very helpful for those with straightforward tax filing.

Intuit will vigorously oppose plans from the IRS to offer free tax filing.
"But the success of TurboTax rests on a shaky foundation, one that could collapse overnight if the U.S. government did what most wealthy countries did long ago and made tax filing simple and free for most citizens."
"For more than 20 years, Intuit has waged a sophisticated, sometimes covert war to prevent the government from doing just that, according to internal company and IRS documents and interviews with insiders. The company unleashed a battalion of lobbyists and hired top officials from the agency that regulates it. From the beginning, Intuit recognized that its success depended on two parallel missions: stoking innovation in Silicon Valley while stifling it in Washington."
"Internal presentations lay out company tactics for fighting 'encroachment,' Intuit’s catchall term for any government initiative to make filing taxes easier — such as creating a free government filing system or pre-filling people’s returns with payroll or other data the IRS already has. 'For a decade proposals have sought to create IRS tax software or a ReturnFree Tax System; All were stopped,' reads a confidential 2007 PowerPoint presentation from an Intuit board of directors meeting. The company’s 2014-15 plan included manufacturing '3rd-party grass roots' support."
Link

s-l-o-w-l-y try to explain why an investor, going forward, should invest in either taxable or municipal bond funds in their portfolio's fixed income sleeve instead of say, 5-yr, 4.50%, non-callable CDs.
But please leave out the widely understood part about past performance being no guarantee of future results. Got that part.

s-l-o-w-l-y? I don't know how one writes slowly, but if you're asking for gory details, I'm happy to oblige.
Let's start with the question. It gives as one option a 5-yr, 4.5% non-callable CD. Even non-callable CDs may be redeemed early by a debtor. Should a bank fail (no longer an unexpected event), high yielding CDs may be redeemed by the FDIC or reset to a lower rate by an acquiring bank.
Thus actual rate of return, though highly likely to be as stated, is not certain. Some posters have addressed this risk by saying they would only buy CDs from well-managed banks. You did not. (I discovered that by reading your post s-l-o-w-l-y.)
The question carries an implicit assumption that an investor is absolutely certain that they will not want to withdraw money early. Any possibility of pulling money out would expose the investor to the same interest rate risk as experienced by a bond fund.
Further, the investor would have less flexibility in selling off a CD (basically, all or nothing on a per-CD basis) as opposed to a bond fund where one can sell as little as 0.001 shares. In addition, the investor would take a big hit on the bid-ask spread that isn't present when selling bond fund shares.
So already we have a reason - flexibility - for an investor to consider using a bond fund rather than a CD with the same (or even marginally lower) expectation value of rate of return. Maybe you wouldn't, but the question was asked about any investor.
That brings us to the expected rate of return going forward. As explained (slowly) above, aside from minor risks expected rate of return is pretty well though not quite 100% certain for the CD. The challenge is to figure out at a minimum what the expected rate of return of a bond fund is. Ideally one would want to estimate not only the expected return but the dispersion of possible outcomes. That plays into risk analysis, which I'll (slowly) get to.
What you did was look at past 5 year returns. In do so, you acknowledged but disregarded the fact that past returns may be poor predictors of future returns. Putting that problem aside, you also disregarded that fact that all rates were lower over the past five years than they are now. One could make at least a passing attempt at compensating for this this by looking at 5 year CD rates 5 years ago vs. now and adjusting the question's comparison accordingly.
According to depositaccounts.com, 5 years ago the best one could do was about 3.3%, while now it is, as you stated, about 4.5%. So if we use your method of estimating bond fund returns going forward based on past performance, we should adjust those past performance figures upward by about 1.2%. I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.
But situations change, and as already noted, past returns may be poor predictors.
bond funds returning 7%-8% over any LT period of time ... just doesn't happen.
This is easy to disprove by counter example. It does sometimes happen. From inception (12/31/1986) through the end of 2002, VBMFX had an annualized return of 7.85%. More generally, looking at 10 year rolling averages, AAA corporate bonds had annualized returns ranging between 7.30% and 11.29%(!) for every 10 year period ending between 1975 and 2000. So, over a period of at least 30 years (three non-overlapping ten year periods between 1965 and 1995) the average return on AAA corporates was more than 7.3%. That seems long term enough.
Baa corporates did even better. Their 10 year average rate of return surpassed 7.26% every 10 year period ending between 1973 and 2005, topping out at a 10 year average return of 12.84%. Interested in T-bonds? The same analysis shows that 10 year T-bonds had ten year rolling average returns exceeding 7.12% for every period ending between 1984 and 2002.
Source is spreadsheet from NYU/Stern, whose ultimate data source is FRED.
Even though you asked for an explanation given s-l-o-w-l-y, I can understand your quick and dirty search for 5 year bond fund returns. I can understand your saying that there were 1921 funds even though 138 of them didn't have five year records. I can understand your excluding the 114 funds that are closed at Fidelity, even if some of them were open five years ago.
I can understand your using Fidelity's screener though it gives fewer than half the number taxable bond funds with 5 year records that Portfolio Visualizer's screener returns. Because a reasonable (though unverified) assumption is that the funds currently open and sold by Fidelity are representative of all the bond funds available five years ago.
But when it comes to expected returns going forward, one is going to have to do better than assert 7%-8% LT returns just don't happen.
So far, most of what I've done is explain why some of the data presented is either unhelpful, biased, or simply wrong. I've also provided one rationale for preferring bond funds to broker-sold CDs, viz. flexibility.
Implicit in your reasoning (and that of most others) is that investors are risk averse. Someone who is truly risk indifferent will consider a bond fund with an expected 4.5% return to be just as good - not better, not worse - than a CD at that rate. (As I explained before, given the additional risk of possibly needing access to the money, someone who is risk indifferent would demand a higher rate from the CD than from the bond fund.)
An investor who is only slightly risk averse will not need a much higher expected rate of return to choose the bond fund. So the question comes down to: what is a reasonable expectation for five year returns of some bond funds? Past performance used blindly clearly is not a good approach to answer this; there have been extended periods of time when bonds have returned well in execess of 7%. It could happen again.
The question is not what has happened before, but what (and why) one expects going forward.
Others have offered some explanations for better returns going forward - based on their expectations for interest rates. I could dig up a bunch of papers explaining that over particular long terms, what one should expect from bond funds (total return) is determined by their current yields. That's how I look at bond funds, assuming that I'll hold for a long period of time.
Checking out current SEC yields, it's not hard to find several familiar funds yielding above 4.5%. Many multisector funds sport yields above 6% (i.e. 1.5% or more above the CD) such as DBLNX (8.69%) and MWFSX (7.69%). PIMIX (5.86%) comes in just below 6%, but still well above the CD rate. The core plus fund TGLMX has a 6.17% yield. Even a fund as conservative as FCNVX has a yield above 5% and can serve as a dynamic (flexible) cash backup.
(These are not recommendations; just a listing a few familiar funds.)
We've seen this question before: RPHYX/RPHIX vs. 6 mo T-bills. As here, I used current data, not past performance (i.e. 2022 or earlier). What one gleans from past performance is general behavior of a fund, not performance that can be easily extrapolated.

@Sven. +1.