Author Archive: Brett Owens

We’re more than halfway through Year 1 of Trump 2.0, and I stand by what I said before Inauguration Day: This administration has ushered in a stock picker’s market.

In other words, investors who make smart moves into, and out of, individual dividend payers will do the best in the coming three-and-a-half years.

That puts holders of SPY, which must hold the entire S&P 500, in a jam. The S&P 500 trades at a nosebleed 25-times earnings, and SPY has no manager to shift away from overbought names and toward overlooked bargains. That’s dangerous ground.

With that in mind, let’s run through four tickers (all of which, yes, are SPY holdings) I urge you to avoid—or dump if you’re sitting on them now.… Read more

Worried about a market pullback?

Let’s discuss seven sturdy dividends with yields up to 8%. These are “low beta” stocks which means they stand tall when the market sinks. Low beta stocks may still go down, but they tend to regress less than average.

And generally speaking, the lower the beta, the more cushion to the downside. The lower a stock’s beta, the less volatile (the less it moves) compared to a benchmark (like the S&P 500). It’s really easy:

Beta more than 1 = more volatile than the market.

Beta less than 1 = less volatile than the market.

Then we want to pair low beta with high dividend yields.… Read more

Monthly bills are no problem for careful contrarian readers banking 8.8% yields in monthly divvies. Let’s discuss this rare but excellent dividend breed, the company or fund that pays monthly instead of quarterly.

Only 6% of dividend payers dish monthly. The rest are quarterly or annually, which will likely not be in time to cover your upcoming cell phone bill.

My monthly email from carrier Verizon arrives in a day or two. Another $267.26 will be debited from my account automatically on the 20th of August.

Fortunately, Verizon notes that there is “nothing I need to do” thanks to AutoPay.… Read more

Here’s something most people forget about interest rates: The Fed does not call all the shots here.

This means that, in the coming months, we may see a setup where the Fed’s rate—the “overnight” rate at which financial institutions lend to each other—and the 10-year Treasury rate (pacesetter for business and consumer loans) part company.

Today we’re going to dig into a “stealth” 5.7%-paying stock that’s a perfect contrarian play on this situation. This one pays us every month, too.

Fed Cuts … and Rates Soar!?

I say that this “rate split” is possible because, well, it’s already happened in the last few months.… Read more

The Nasdaq has been rallying nonstop since April. Let’s discuss three payouts up to 11.2% that play the rally.

The catalyst is the “rise of the machines” with companies replacing expensive humans with cheaper robots and AI tools. Hiring numbers are down and (paradoxically to some) the Nasdaq continues to levitate higher.

This summer heater in tech stocks is no surprise to us contrarians. The Naz tech giants are enjoying expanding profit margins! Amazon (AMZN) CEO Andy Jassy recently admitted the company’s workforce will shrink, replaced by AI. This is bad for those who work at Amazon, but great for those who own AMZN.… Read more

Holding low-yielding shares? Here’s how to boost dividends up to 35%—no buying or selling needed.

We’ll use boring ol’ SPY—SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY)—as our first example. The fund yields a sleepy 1.1%, yet it’s the most owned ticker in America.

Here’s how we fix SPY’s yield problem.

On Monday, I received an email from OptionSignals, the timing system I developed for Contrarian Outlook readers who write covered calls and sell puts to generate income. OptionSignals tells us when it is a promising time to write calls or sell puts on an index, fund or individual stock.… Read more

I have to laugh when I hear the phrase “return to the office.”

I mean, COVID started more than five years ago. With the turnover in Corporate America since then, we can hardly call what’s happening now a “return.”

Most of those “returning” aren’t even the same people!

Nonetheless, the, shall we say, revenge, of the office is real. My wife and I saw it firsthand when we went to an open house here in Sacramento a few months ago. Staring into the front room, labeled “home office,” my wife said, “Programmer.”

“They’re hoping for a rentback,” said the realtor.… Read more

Brand new dividends are often the best divvies to buy. Here why.

Companies typically initiate a new payout when they are serious about it. This means not only is management going to make sure the dividend is adequately funded, but they are also likely to raise it in a year.

Perennial raises command our attention because these growing payouts tend to pull their stock prices higher. This is the “Dividend Magnet” phenomenon we often discuss and highlight in my Hidden Yields research advisory. The most lucrative stocks to buy today are the ones that are growing their payouts the fastest tomorrow.… Read more

Money market accounts still offer 5%, but these rates won’t last. Short-term yields are dropping, fast.

With the “safe 5% party” ending, you and I should skedaddle to the “11% yield afterparty” now. Fear not, my fellow contrarian—I have an extra dividend VIP pass for you.

Fed Chair Jay Powell’s tenure is in the homestretch. Whether or not ol’ Jay makes it to the finish or gets hauled off prematurely, the Chair is a lame duck as far as the markets are concerned.

Traders are pricing in two Fed cuts over the next nine months. Meanwhile, the industry projects money market rates to plummet to 3.8% by year end, with the 2-year Treasury yield also trending down, currently at 3.9%.… Read more

There aren’t many things we can say for certain these days, but there is one: We dividend investors are far better off than the mainstream crowd!

Consider the poor souls holding “America’s ticker”—my name for the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY). I call it that because, well, pretty well everyone owns it. These folks white-knuckled it through the April “tariff tantrum” and are now on a knife edge as the ETF bobs around near all-time highs, boosting the odds of yet another sharp drop.

Of course, pullbacks are a constant in investing (and something we contrarians love to tap for bargains!).… Read more