Author Archive: Brett Owens

If you woke up this morning and thought to yourself:

“Well, at least that’s over with!”

You’re not alone. Historically speaking, financial markets in the US don’t seem to care which side wins on Election Night (or, in the drawn-out days and weeks that will follow). The important thing for the markets is that the election uncertainty is largely over.

As the political carnival fades into our rearview mirror, we’re left with some dividends that made out better than others. Let’s review these winners and losers now.

Winner: Financial Markets

Since March 2009, the long-term (multi-year) trend of the stock market has been up.… Read more

I sure hope you haven’t listened to the bleating pundits begging us to sell everything ahead of Election Day. These talking heads don’t realize that, historically speaking, cash has already turned to trash.

It’s at times like these—when everyone is panicking and another big selloff seems right around the corner—that fortunes are made. And they’re not made by being out of stocks for the six months when they tend to rally (November 1 to May 1).

I know this sounds strange, but hear me out. Because we’ve got a shot at big gains (and dividends!) setting up our portfolios before E-Day comes and goes.… Read more

Why choose between dividends and growth when we can have both?

Thanks to popular payout programs from the likes of Apple (AAPL) and Microsoft (MSFT), investors can buy a growthy tech stock and even enjoy a little income on the side.

“63% of the (information technology) sector constituents paid a regular dividend,” says Todd Rosenbluth, Head of ETF & Mutual Fund Research for CFRA. In other words: While tinier tech stocks might have to plow everything into M&A, larger tech stocks that have already reached scale generate lots of cash—which they can shower shareholders with.

But there’s just one catch with these tech dividends.… Read more

Last week, on our dividend trading webcast, several readers asked me how I manage my own money. Well, it’s a bit different from the “buy and hold” (or hope!) strategies employed by most income investors. Here’s why…

I don’t like holding full positions during downturns. When the market looks like it’s about to roll over, or when it actually begins to roll over, I (personally) head for the sidelines.

And when the pullback is over, I flip my cash back into the market. It’s that simple.

Following this strategy, there have really only been four “trades” to make all year.… Read more

It’s rare when we get not one but two crashes bigger than 10%+ in a single year—but hey, it’s 2020. Anything goes.

But take just a second and imagine that you dodged both of those disasters, resting easily on the sidelines during the chaos. Then you moved into stocks for the rest of the year. In that case, 2020 just may be your best year yet!

 A “Dream” Strategy (That’s Possible to Achieve!)

Of course, no one can precisely predict the market’s next move. But what I’m about to show you is as close as I’ve ever seen an investing system get.… Read more

Firms increasing their dividends in 2020, of all years, are sending a powerful “payout confidence” signal to Wall Street:

Our dividend is safe—so secure, in fact, that we’re hiking it. Watch our stock price follow.

The bigger the increase, the greater the level of confidence. In a minute, we’ll investigate five of these dividend buy signals.

S&P Dow Jones Indices’ Howard Silverblatt writes that there were 309 dividend increases during the third quarter, versus 102 declines—better than the 244 versus 639 “upside-down” split from Q2. (Though we’re still grading worse than this quarter last year, when 426 firms raised and only 94 cut.)… Read more

Successful dividend investing is simple, though not necessarily easy. There are nuances which trip up many investors (including most professionals!). These twists and turns create “yield alpha” opportunities for contrarian-minded income investors like us.

If everyone else in the market were perfectly grounded and calculated, there would be no chance for us to make above-average returns. Thanks to these inefficiencies, we are able to bank big yields and price gains in Dividend Land. Ready to retire on dividends? Follow these five steps and we’ll do it together. Let’s start with an obvious yet underappreciated rule for income investors.

Step 1: Count Your Dividends

Since we focus on high yield, most of our returns come from the “yield” component of stocks.… Read more

My indicators are pointing to one thing right now: higher stock prices, with new all-time highs next year. So this is a great time to lock in some fresh 8%+ payouts—before their prices race away from us!

But wait a minute. The economy stinks and our political process seems more dysfunctional than ever. So why would stocks climb from here?

Money Printer Goes Brrrrr…

The answer lies with Fed Chair Jay Powell’s printing press monetary policy. Since March, he’s been flooding the economy with liquidity. Other central banks around the world have been generous, too.

Powell Goes All In

We both know that printing buckets of money is a recipe for higher inflation.… Read more

We can’t take every dividend we see at face value. Especially when we’re talking about 8%, 9% and even 10% yields.

Bull markets, government stimulus, money printing and the scent of all-time highs might give the impression that any stock is safe. Unfortunately that isn’t the case. Even in a bull market, there are dividend traps paying 8% to 10% that’ll sink despite the broader rising tide.

The market might have taken a deep breather earlier this spring, but multiple expansion hardly slept a wink. Thanks to battered earnings, the S&P 500 has only gotten more expensive as the year has rolled on.… Read more

Earlier this year, we added Synovus (SNV) to our Contrarian Income Report portfolio. We’ve enjoyed 36% total returns—including a couple of fat dividends—in the six months since. On a yearly basis, these gains annualize to 75%.

“Can we do this every time?” subscribers have asked?

That’s asking a bit much, but it doesn’t hurt to ask. (My young daughters know this well, because they are not shy about asking to eat ice cream at every meal!)

After all, if we reach for 75% yearly gains and have to “settle” for 17.5% profits, we’ll take that. It’s really about the process and stacking the probabilities in our favor on each given dividend purchase.… Read more