TreasuryDirect

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TreasuryDirect is a U.S. Treasury service that lets individual investors buy and manage government securities online. It’s run by the Bureau of the Fiscal Service and started in 1986 as a computer-based system that used mail, with the online system launching in 2002.

You can buy electronic Treasury bills, notes, bonds, TIPS, floating-rate notes, and Series I and EE Savings Bonds, and manage all of them in one account. There are no fees to open an account, buy or redeem securities, or maintain the account. You can link a bank account for deposits and withdrawals, and you can have parts of your income tax refund or paychecks deposited directly into TreasuryDirect.

TreasuryDirect also helps convert paper savings bonds to electronic form and offers Treasury Hunt to find matured bonds you can cash in. Paper savings bonds were phased out in the early 2010s, and new sales have been online since then. A replacement system called TRIM/MyTreasury has been in development since 2013, but it has faced delays and higher costs.

The site can have security steps like identity verification, and it has occasionally experienced outages when demand is high. Savings bonds can be attractive during inflation spikes, which has drawn many new users at times.

In short, TreasuryDirect provides a straightforward way to buy, manage, and cash U.S. government securities online, with ongoing efforts to upgrade the system.