AGG max drawdown: 17.1%
iShares Core US Aggregate Bond ETF. From its 2020-07-31 peak, AGG fell 17.1% to the 2022-10-31 trough and has not yet made a new high. Computed from 679 months of history starting 1970-01-31, including extended pre-ETF data where available.
The US investment-grade bond market.
AGG drawdown statistics
2020-07-31 peak to 2022-10-31 trough.
Still below the prior peak.
Share of all months spent below a prior high.
Rolling year ending 2022-10-31.
For context, SPY (the S&P 500 baseline) had a maximum drawdown of 50.8% over the same kind of monthly-close analysis.
The biggest AGG drawdowns on record
| Depth | Peak | Trough | Recovered | Peak to trough | Total underwater |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -17.1% | 2020-07-31 | 2022-10-31 | not yet | 27 mo | 6.0 years |
| -15.8% | 1979-06-30 | 1980-02-29 | 1980-05-31 | 8 mo | 11 months |
| -14.6% | 1980-06-30 | 1981-09-30 | 1981-11-30 | 15 mo | 17 months |
| -10.8% | 1987-01-31 | 1987-09-30 | 1990-11-30 | 8 mo | 3.8 years |
| -8.0% | 1984-01-31 | 1984-05-31 | 1984-08-31 | 4 mo | 7 months |
Methodology: monthly closing prices, peak-to-trough on total return where available. History extends before the ETF's launch via documented proxy chains (index funds, indices, and academic series), the same data that powers BestFolio's strategy backtests. Educational information, not investment advice.
Drawdowns are the reason tactical strategies exist
Buy-and-hold AGG means living through every number on this page. BestFolio tracks published TAA strategies whose whole job is cutting these drawdowns, with out-of-sample track records.