"W" wrote in message
...
I am perplexed why does the Yield to Maturity function need to be fed an
"issue date" as a parameter? If I invest in a bond today with maturity
of
2/1/2013 and the bond sell for 80% of par and has a 5% coupon, why would I
care about an issue date? The formula is:

YIELDMAT(settlement,maturity,issue,rate,pr,basis)

A follow on question is why doesn't Yield to Maturity function let you
specify whether the bond is paid quarterly, semi-annually, annually, etc?

--
W