Author Archive: Brett Owens

Most “first-level investors” believe that investing is an either-or proposition. A stock or fund can deliver eye-popping yield … or it can deliver breakneck growth. But not both.

That’s simply not true. We’ll prove that today by highlighting three stocks yielding 6% to 9% with 20% price upside to boot.

Remember, total returns are made up of dividends and price appreciation. The latter, price gains, are driven by some combination of:

1. Dividend raises (which inspire investors to pay more for the stock or fund), and/or
2. A climb towards fair value (a closing of the discount window in a closed-end fund’s (CEF’s) case, or a higher multiple on FFO for a REIT).

Closed-end fund (CEF) investors are going crazy again. This time, they’re grossly overpaying.

Today we’ll discuss five incredibly popular funds that are not likely to become more celebrated, and should be sold immediately.

Yes, first-level income hounds can be as greedy as they are fearful. In January 2016, they wanted nothing to do with CEFs. Exactly when many funds were about to embark on an 18-month tear!

Yet today, they’re willing to pay $1.49 for just $1 in assets. This is a recipe to lose money. Or at best, see your portfolio trade sideways.

This Discount/Premium as Margin of Safety (or Lack Thereof)

CEFs, unlike their mutual fund cousins, have fixed share counts.… Read more

The desperate hunt for yield is getting way out of hand—and it’s setting up a terrific buying opportunity for you and me.

How out of hand?

Consider that some investors are so income starved they’re piling into sovereign bonds from Iraq—a country that’s still a war zone!

The latest issuance of five-year bonds by the Iraqi government was slated for $1 billion. But investors spied the 7% yield on offer here and crashed the doors, racking up nearly $7 billion in orders.

It’s sad, and totally unnecessary.

A Secure Portfolio With a Life-Changing 8% Yield

The worst thing is, in their scramble for income, the herd is charging right past yields that are even bigger—and far safer—here in the U.S.A.,… Read more

Don’t take any stated yields for granted these days! The financial news has been flooded with dividend cuts lately, with Teva Pharmaceutical (TEVA) and Mattel (MAT) taking the hatchet to their payouts, and telecom Windstream (WIN) dropping its dividend too.

It’s dangerous to buy headline yields – or even supposedly “safe” blue chips with more modest dividends – without looking at the profits funding these payouts. Companies with high payout ratios (how much in earnings, funds from operations and other measures a company pays out in the form of dividends) are a twofold risk:

1. High payout ratios can lead to a slowing in dividend growth, which means your payout is increasingly likely to fall behind inflation.

Don’t take any dividends for granted today. Business disruption is accelerating as entire industries are being eaten alive.

Uber and Lyft? Killed cabs.

Amazon (AMZN)? It’s crushing retail, and starving their REIT landlords right before our very eyes.

And soon, they might team up to offer more same day deliveries – and make more rivals obsolete!

These types of disturbances have added a new layer to contrarian investing. Before, it was as simple as buying stocks when they were out-of-favor and holding them until they became back in vogue. The “Dogs of the Dow” strategy, for example, usually beat the market by banking the highest blue chip dividend yields – a sign that the tide was ready to turn back in the dogs favor.… Read more

Last week, I gave you a peek under the hood of my “8% No-Withdrawal Retirement Portfolio.” I also showed you a ridiculously cheap fund with a 9% dividend yield you can get in on now.

Today I’ll reveal another off-the-radar investment that forms the second pillar of this “crash-proof” portfolio.

I’ll also name a popular dividend ETF boasting a tempting 4.5% yield. That may sound great … but it’s actually a trap waiting to spring!

More on that in a moment.

First, the sector I’m going to draw your attention to is a corner of the market you must be in if you want to get the safe 8%+ dividend yields you’ll need to retire on dividends alone.… Read more

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) offer “one-click” diversification. Investors buy ETFs to hedge against individual stock collapses.

ETFs can also offer big yields. We’ll look at 11 of them today, with dividends starting at 4% and climbing all the way up to an amazing 21%!

Is the 21%er a trap? Of course it is. But my favorite double-digit payer isn’t – in fact, its 10% payout is secure and spectacular. But this “last safe 10% yield” won’t last long – they never do!

So read on to learn about my best income buy as we round out today’s diversified dividend dozen.

Guggenheim Shipping ETF (SEA)
Dividend Yield: 4%

The Guggenheim Shipping ETF (SEA) invests in a bundle of companies with shipping operations across the world.… Read more

You may think $500,000 isn’t enough money to retire on.

It is. Because with two quick steps, you can transform any $500K “buy and hope” portfolio into a $3,279 monthly income stream:

1. First, sell everything. Including the 2%, 3% and even 4% payers that simply don’t yield enough to really matter. Then,
2. Buy my 8 favorite monthly dividend payers.

The result? $3,279.69 in monthly income every month (from an average 7.6% annual yield, paid every 30 days).

With upside on your initial $500,000 to boot!

Traditional dividend stocks simply can’t keep up, and I’ll show you why. Let’s take a 4-pack of popular names Procter & Gamble (PG), McDonald’s (MCD), Altria (MO), and General Mills (GIS) to illustrate how much they’ll pay investors the rest of the year.… Read more

This levitating stock market is terrible news for anyone who wants to actually retire. That’s because it’s keeping S&P 500 dividend yields in the dumpster, at a hair under 1.9% now.

But there’s a better way—an 8% retirement-survival strategy, to be specific—that’ll earn you $40,000 annually on a $500,000 portfolio. With capital gains upside, to boot.

You read that right.

Most “first-level” investors have no clue the investments I’m going to tell you about even exist. That’s why most folks pile into blue chips, wrongly thinking they’re the ones at fault for not having saved the massive nest egg they need to get a livable income stream.… Read more