Author Archive: Brett Owens

“Special” dividends fly right under Wall Street’s radar. Which is great for contrarian income seekers like us. These payouts aren’t officially “counted” by most mainstream websites!

It’s a big accounting error in our favor because these dividends can really add up. Today we’ll discuss five special dividend payers with yields up to 16%.

Most websites won’t report 16%, of course. For whatever reason, they just can’t compute specials!

Special dividends are technically considered one-time payouts. So, vanilla websites assume they won’t happen again, and thus leave them out of their yield calculations.

But there’s more than one kind of special dividend.… Read more

“Why is Arbor Realty (ABR) up 10% this morning?”

The emails piled in. And obviously, yes, it was this Tweet from Roaring Kitty—the high priest of meme stocks—that sent highly-shorted stocks higher.

Source: X.com

His real-life identity is Keith Gill. He’s a former financial analyst turned meme stock diocesan. In 2020, Keith aka Roaring Kitty led the charge behind the short squeeze of GameStop (GME), which sent that dinosaur stock (briefly) into orbit.

The mere hint that Gill was back in the game was enough for his disciples to bid up old flames GameStop and AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC).… Read more

This onshoring trend is roaring—but we contrarian dividend investors still have time to cash in. I’ve got a “3-pack” of cheap stocks that lets us do that, with dividends that are surging (or are about to!) below.

The two latest signs we’re in the midst of “Industrial Revolution II” here in the US? According to new Census Department figures, Detroit, the HQ of industrial America, is seeing its population grow again for the first time since 1957!

The “OG” Industrial Boom

And the latest round in the tariff wars? They’ll almost certainly send more companies scurrying to America.

Think “Picks and Shovels” for the Best Plays on Industrial Revolution II

If you’ve been reading my articles for a while, you know I love “pick-and-shovel” stocks.… Read more

What’s better than a big dividend?

A hated high yield.

Especially when the disgust comes from Wall Street analysts themselves. You know, the fanboys who follow the company for a living.

Analysts are paid to be bullish. Let’s face it, nobody wants to hear from a bear. Here’s how unusual is it for analysts to be down on a stock?

There are just two consensus Sell calls across the entire S&P 500. Two.

So, when one of the suits says a business is bad, we should take note, right?

Wrong.

Analysts tend to be trend followers. And as they say in the business, the trend is your friend until it ends.… Read more

Remember when the Federal Reserve stopped printing money for a few months? It didn’t go well.

Yes, I’m making fun. A bit. Chairman Jay Powell did abstain from his printing press for nine full months.

The year, as you’ll recall, was 2022. Headline inflation topped 8%. Eight! Jay, who had been blaming every supply chain from here to Shanghai for the price pressures, ran out of excuses. He held down the power button on his money printer for a hard reset.

Stocks sank 18% that calendar year. Bonds did worse—they completely blew up. A perfectly “safe” fund of US Treasuries, iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) was anything but, shedding 31%.… Read more

It blows me away that folks still think high interest rates will be around forever. Truth is, rates are already starting to fall!

But no one’s really paying attention (yet!). Which leaves us a brief window to lock in some sweet 8%+ dividends from one of our favorite utility-focused funds. This bargain-priced buy soars when rates drop.

Look Beyond the Headlines for the Real Rate Story

Remember January, when all the talk was about how rates would be cut six times this year?

Poof. Those hopes were history before winter—such as it was—ended.

Nowadays, futures traders have almost completely thrown in the towel—they’re calling for just two rate cuts between now and January.… Read more

Small-cap stocks are on sale. We can buy select names for just 8.8 times earnings and 83% of book value.

Large cap stocks rarely sell this cheap. That is the problem with popularity! Which is why we’re looking small but thinking big, eyeing payouts between 7.3% and 13.8%.

(Those dividends are no typos. The beauty of being nimble individual investors means we can fish in these small but potentially lucrative ponds.)

Now small cap stocks aren’t always this cheap. Traditionally, smaller firms trade at a premium to their large-cap counterparts given their outsized upside potential. But today, small caps are less expensive by just about every valuation measure.… Read more

DoubleLine Income Solutions (DSL) took its biannual trip to the bargain bin a few weeks ago. It was a short stay, as usual.

By mid-April, vanilla investors had worked themselves into a hysterical state. They somehow convinced themselves that the Federal Reserve was going to continue raising rates.

Let me repeat—they worried that, in an election year, the Fed was going to keep on hiking. Unlikely.

Even Bloomberg lamented that traders saw “no relief in sight for bonds.” A hopeless howl that piqued our contrarian interest. No doubt, relief was just around the corner.

Indeed it was in the form of Chairman Jay Powell and his soothing postgame pillow talk.… Read more

“Don’t fight the Fed” is my top investing rule—but what the heck do we do when Jay Powell says one thing and then does another?

We buy bonds! Below we’ll dive into a bond fund kicking out a sweet 9% yield and sending payouts our way every month.

But first, let’s get to the heart of the Fed chief’s doublespeak.

Did you watch Powell’s press conference last week?

If you’re like me, you probably weren’t surprised by most of it. He did his usual tough-guy talk on rates. But then, almost as an aside, he said the Fed is slowing its campaign to shrink its balance sheet—known as “quantitative tightening.”… Read more

Stock market rallies climb walls of worry. Well, we have no shortage of such worries today!

A few days ago, Bloomberg lamented there was “no relief in sight for bonds”. This was ironic because relief—the catalyst for the next big bond rally—is hidden in plain sight. Despite the despair, 10-year Treasury rates are still a ways off from their recent 5% highs last October:

Reality Check: Rates Still Lower Than Last Year

If they put in a “lower high”—as I’m expecting they will, thanks to a slowing economy and labor market—it will be wildly bullish for bonds (which trade inverse rates.)… Read more