Author Archive: Brett Owens

The suits on Wall Street will say that $460K isn’t enough to retire on.

Well, that “modest” nest egg will earn $64,860 in dividends alone when invested in this simple 7-CEF portfolio.

CEFs are the code name for closed-end funds. They are a lesser-known cousin to exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and mutual funds. CEFs tend to have modest assets under management. Which is their superpower. Fewer assets mean greater yields!

Consider the 7-CEF portfolio we are about to discuss versus the standard high-yield stock benchmark ETF:

There is no comparison! But before we buy blindly, let’s do our homework and make sure these CEFs are not paper payout tigers.… Read more

I’d like to share my simple “Made for 2025” Dividend Plan with you. It’s a simple, safe strategy that identifies dividend stocks with payouts set to surge higher.

As these divvies pop, so do their associated stock prices.

The truth is, this proven system works no matter what the economy, or the Fed (or even the executive branch of the federal government!) is doing. It’s the path to peppy price gains from protected payers.

Let’s talk about a timely example—a dividend dip to enjoy! On the campaign trail, President-Elect Trump presented us with a pullback in perennial dividend grower Deere & Co (DE) thanks to these comments:

“They’ve announced a few days ago that they are going to move a lot of their manufacturing business to Mexico.

At times like these, I’m reminded of a quote from Howard Marks, the most successful value investor you’ve likely never heard of. (Warren Buffett is a fan.)

Marks’s monthly “Oaktree Memos” are well worth a read. And in his insightful book, The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor, he wrote:

“What’s clear to the broad consensus of investors is almost always wrong.”

This quote has been on my mind lately because everyone is convinced that Trump 2.0 will lead to higher inflation.

I’m sure you can see where I’m going: Higher inflation begets higher interest rates.… Read more

Trump 2.0 will feature Wall Street-approved suit Scott Bessent as Treasury secretary. Bessent will advocate for financial deregulation and increased lending. Easier and faster money. Which will be a boon for private equity (PE) firms and business development companies (BDCs).

Today we’ll discuss seven BDCs yielding between 11.1% and 14.2%. They operate like PE shops—both will benefit from a friendly deal-making environment.

For our income investing purposes, we pick BDCs because it is easier to buy them.

We can buy BDCs individually as we would any stock. And BDCs can avoid taxes at the federal level by paying out at least 90% of their taxable earnings to shareholders in the form of dividends.… Read more

Are higher interest rates and lower bond prices a sure thing for 2025? Mainstream financial pundits say yes.

Which gives us thoughtful contrarians pause. Their narrative against bonds is assumed. When this happens, markets tend to move in the opposite direction of conventional wisdom.

Which means we should bet with bonds. At least in the near term to start the new year. Let’s watch bonds rally and surprise everyone except for us. The “Trump is bad for bonds” trade may eventually be correct, but my hunch again is that this “surefire” call is early.

For all the recent commotion, the 10-year Treasury yield bounces between 3.3% and 5%, with an even narrower 3.6% to 4.7% range recently.… Read more

We’re now well on our way to Trump 2.0, and I’m getting a lot of questions from readers about where things head from here.

I see the new administration as overall bullish for stocks. But the truth is, fortunes will be made in the next four years and, sadly, retirements will be lost.

My job is to keep you on the right side of the financial markets. One thing I can say is that the next four years will be challenging for two kinds of investors:

1. Buy-and-hold (or as I like to call them, “buy-and-hope”) types, and …
2. Those who sit in index funds like the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY).

Small cap stocks should benefit from the new administration. Today we’ll discuss four under $20 with yields between 7% and 15.1%.

The Trump 2.0 Trade is rolling and small caps are soaring because they are expected to benefit from reduced regulations. Since November 6, the small have become mighty, outperforming their larger counterparts:

Election Flips the Small-Cap Script

Too much too soon? The counterpoint is inflation, which is likely to remain sticky. Which means interest rates will remain higher than Wall Street previously hoped. Higher rates are a headwind for smaller companies, which tend to be debt machines. (They lack the cash flow of the giants.)… Read more

It’s a tradition unlike any other! Move over, Masters. In these contrarian pages we select one dividend stock (or fund) for the year ahead.

Last year we bet on a “safe, somewhat-secret” 7.4% dividend from Jamie Dimon & Co with iShares JP Morgan USD Emerging Markets Bond ETF (EMB). EMB’s payout plus price gains combined for a 12% total return.

Nice. This is exactly what we look for as income investors. A high-yield investment that will pay us our divvies—and gain a bit in price. But this year we are flipping the script. My favorite divvie stock for next year is a growth play with a lot of upside but only a modest 2.2% current yield.… Read more

Most people think inflation will rise in a second Trump term—we can see it in the jump in 10-year Treasury rates over the last few weeks.

But that trade is getting just a little bit crowded—and we contrarians are going to take advantage of that with a 10.4%-yielding closed-end fund (CEF) that’s come back to earth as a result.

This situation reminds me a little of October 2023, when investors were also betting on “inflation forever.” We didn’t buy it then, either. Instead I named the DoubleLine Yield Opportunities Fund (DLY), payer of a 9.5% yield at the time, as one of the top portfolio buys in my Contrarian Income Report service.… Read more

Today we’ll discuss a 5.4% dividend that actually annualizes to 7%. A 5.7% payer that really dishes 12.4%. And even a headline 15% yield that is understated because the company handed out 16.1% last year.

Wait. What?

These “typos” fool the mainstream financial websites. We are discussing special dividends today. Payouts that are awarded as a bonus to regular quarterly dividends.

Only a select few firms dish specials. Sometimes, it’s thanks to a sudden influx of money. Let’s take billboard and transit display giant Outfront Media (OUT) which sold its Canadian business for C$410 million in cash in June.

Fast forward to November, and Outfront announced a massive 75-cent special dividend on top of its 30-cent quarterly dividend, vaulting its 12-month yield from a healthy 6.3% to a mouth-watering 10.2%.… Read more