Author Archive: Brett Owens

Inflation forever?

The fear has taken root seemingly everywhere: the media, the bond market, the futures market. They’ve all bought into the idea that scorching price hikes (and high interest rates) are here to stay.

If you’re like me, my fellow contrarian, you’re paying attention—but you also know something else about times like these: When everyone expects something to happen, something else usually does.

That’s what I want to talk to you about today. Because all the data I’m watching tells me the crowd is wrong: It’s deflation, not inflation they should be focused on.

Falling rates, not rising rates.… Read more

We contrarians always need to remain a step ahead. That means to find the best deals and yields, we need to be where everyone else isn’t (yet).

Right now, that means we’re taking a trip to the bank—to collect up to 12.3% annually in dividend checks.

Financials are in the tank. They are the dogs of 2026 thus far. A proposed national cap on credit card interest rates spooked mega-banks like Citigroup (C) and integrated card companies like Capital One Financial (COF). Then, advances in artificial intelligence sent shockwaves throughout the software industry, stoking a panic among private lenders like business development companies (BDCs) as well as traditional banks.… Read more

Think it’s a good idea to ask ChatGPT to run your retirement portfolio?

(I know that you don’t, my careful contrarian. But we both have friends that are more than tempted to trust the bots! Here are the cautionary numbers that show AI models are not very good at running money.)

A startup called Nof1 recently ran an experiment. It handed $10,000 each to Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok and four other leading AI tools. The humans gave “seed capital” to the bots.

Here’s $10K. You have two weeks to trade US stocks. Make some money. Now GO.

How much do you think each bot turned its initial $10K into?… Read more

Most people think you can’t time the market. That’s nonsense. Not only is it possible, it’s easy.

That’s a bold claim, I know.

Today I’m going to show you how to do it with far less risk than the average investor would face. The best part? We don’t have to wait for the next panic to put our plan to work. We can start now.

This strategy not only helps shield us in a panic—it leverages market chaos for bigger gains (and a fatter income stream) down the road. That’s in large part because of this plan’s “secret weapon”: dividends. Or more specifically dividend growth.… Read more

Using vanilla websites for your dividend research? Be careful.

Many of these mainstream sites miss the most important payment of the year for “special” dividend companies!

This oversight could have us overlooking thousands of dollars in potential yearly income. And yields up to 14.6%!

Would you believe what this 14.6% payer is listed at on these lame sites? 0.2%. Zero-point-two percent.

Yup. Which is why we contrarians do our research with a focus on special dividends.

Specials uncommon enough that many investors don’t know much (if anything) about them. In short, they’re one-time cash payouts, usually the result of a massive capital boost—say, selling off a piece of the company or delivering blowout annual profits.… Read more

Two dividend cuts in the last two quarters, and we are buying.

Wait. What?

When do we ever chase one dividend cut, let alone two? Let me tell you when, my fellow contrarian!

A Terrible Divvie Trend and We’re In?

Let’s start with the fantastic yield. At 15.3%, FS KKR Capital Corp (FSK) has our attention. That doesn’t mean buy—we don’t chase headline yields around here without doing our homework. But in this case, management is redirecting the money saved from these cuts into share buybacks. 

Which means we’ll likely see price appreciation as shares move closer to fair value.… Read more

Last week’s hot inflation reports have handed us a timely “two-step” 10.3% dividend opportunity. We’re going to jump on it today.

Here’s our plan:

• Step 1: We grab a 10.3% average dividend now, to fend off rising inflation, then …
• Step 2: We ride along as interest rates fall, driving up the value of the two funds behind that steady 10.3% divvie.

I know, I know. How can I be talking about falling rates at a time like this?

The Strait of Hormuz is closed. Oil is at $100. And last week saw two hot inflation reports: CPI hit 3.8% in April, and the PPI (producer price index) soared 6%.… Read more

Let’s capitalize on analyst incompetence—and bank yields up to 18.3%, with upside to boot!

A widely cited academic study on analyst target price accuracy found that only about 54% of 12-month price targets correctly predicted even the direction of the subsequent price move.

Fifty-four percent. On direction alone. That’s barely better than a coin flip!

Analysts give specific price targets to stocks like they are scripture. In reality, they don’t even know if the thing is going to move up or down.

And it gets uglier. A 2024 Yale School of Management study found that analysts systematically delay downgrading stocks after bad news—to curry favor with the companies they cover.… Read more

“Merci beaucoup,” your dividend strategist said as he handed three suitcases to his to-the-Paris-airport Uber driver. (I was very proud of myself. Eight days and basically Parisian…)

“Francais?” the driver called my bluff.

“Ah no,” I admitted, hands up, waving off the offer. “She does!” I quickly scapegoated my wife. Who, to her credit, speaks French reasonably well. But the driver was flying with his urgent ask.

Fortunately for phones. She didn’t know what he was asking either, but his phone was translating into English in real time:

There is a bug in my application. Can we cancel the ride?

Then he punched a number into a calculator.… Read more

Stocks are surging—but they’re also developing a case of “bad breadth.” That is, most of the gains are coming from a small slice of the market (I’m looking at you, tech).

That’s good news for us contrarians because this shift has left us some sweet dividend deals in other corners of the market. We’re going to capitalize through 3 discounted closed-end funds (CEFs) yielding up to 11.8%.

Together, they form a tidy “mini-portfolio” that includes blue chips (sans tech), bonds and infrastructure plays. Two of these funds offer payouts that roll out monthly, too.

Start With Stocks—and the Gabelli Equity Trust (GAB)

GAB stands out for another reason beyond its hefty 10.6% payout: It’s one of the few US-stock-focused CEFs whose top-10 holdings aren’t heavily weighted toward tech.… Read more