Salomon Brothers Emerging Market Floating Rate Fund buys adjustable-rate bonds from emerging-market companies and countries.

FORBES: Fixed Income for Bears

Pegged rates are also susceptible to speculative attack, whereas a floating rate can adjust more smoothly to market forces.

ECONOMIST: A kiwi conundrum

One big difference is that Australia, unlike the East Asians before their currencies plunged, has a floating exchange rate which can adjust smoothly to market pressures.

ECONOMIST: Down under

The BOE, with a strong pound and a mortgage market that is almost entirely floating rate, is expected to go higher still, showing the Fed stimulative by contrast.

FORBES: Wal-Mart Or Malpass?

The idea was a cold-turkey cure for endemic balance-of-payments problems, turning economic management on its head by floating sterling and letting the market dictate the exchange rate.

ECONOMIST: Post-war Britain

Looking ahead, managers say capital continues to pour into the market from all quarters as investors look for floating-rate, wide-margin opportunities.

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For one thing, it is hard to know how much companies have in fact lengthened the maturity of their debts because the interest-rate swap market allows them to swap those fixed bond payments into cheaper floating debt, a popular strategy in the investment-grade market.

ECONOMIST: Better to feast on cookies than junk bonds

Take, for example, one indicator of the market's appetite for risk, the spread between swaps of fixed- and floating-rate interest payments (see chart).

ECONOMIST: Nothing to fear but fear itself