Author Archive: Brett Owens

Be careful how you buy your bonds. The most popular tickers have a few “fatal flaws” that’ll doom you to underperformance at best, or leave you hanging in the event of a market meltdown at worst!

Let’s pick on the widely followed and owned iShares iBoxx High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (HYG) as an example. It has attracted $15 billion in assets because:

1. It’s convenient – as easy to buy as a stock.
2. It’s diversified (for better or worse, as we’ll see shortly) with 981 individual holdings.
3. It pays–5.6% today, to be specific.

The accessibility of funds like HYG appears cute and comfortable enough.… Read more

If you’re sitting in “dead money” Treasuries and CDs, the dawn of a new round of interest-rate cuts is probably the last thing you want to hear.

Since Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s “pivot” on rates in early January, the yield on the 10-year Treasury has plunged, from 2.7% to 2.0%.

So if you put a million bucks in Treasuries at the start of the year, you’d be banking $26,900 in income. That’s pathetic enough for a seven-figure nest egg!

But fast-forward just six months, and your mil fetches you far less: just $20,100.

Powell Will Spark a Stampede Into These 8% Dividends

With Treasury rates collapsing and the stock market soaring—driving S&P 500 dividend yields down to a lame 1.7%—there are few places for income-seekers to turn.… Read more

Seven percent dividends.

That’s what my 18 favorite stocks and funds yield on average in my “No Withdrawal” Retirement Portfolio. And it’s that very yield that gives the critically-acclaimed portfolio its name. Investors collect so much income every month that they don’t need to pull out their nest egg to make ends meet.

The regular dividend checks pay the regular bills.

That yield, by the way, was higher just a few months ago, but as prices go up, yields go down … and prices across the portfolio have been going up, up, up!

That’s no happy accident—that’s a vital component to a successful retirement portfolio that many advisors and financial pundits too often miss.… Read more

I often get asked where I’m investing my retirement money. And these days, I’m also asked if this is even an appropriate time to buy stocks!

Well, I personally am buying. For starters, my 401(K) runs on autopilot. Every month, my contribution (and “Brett Inc.” company match) is plowed into Vanguard’s Dividend Growth Fund (VDIGX). No diversification, no market timing–100% into VDIGX.

Why this fund? Because in my plan, I have to choose from a set list Vanguard funds. And I’m naturally looking for an emphasis on dividend growth because I know it’s the path to 10%+ returns every year, a wealth-creating snowball!… Read more

Our Contrarian Income Report mailbag served up an important question from a reader this week. What are the perfect retirement dividends to buy and hold forever?

Our subscriber is retired and manages investments for him and his wife. He asked me how to build a portfolio that will give her reliable income, with little maintenance, if he can no longer look after their investments himself.

It’s a great question, and one that’s likely occurred to you, too. So let’s tackle it.

3 “Autopilot” 8% Dividends You Can Buy Now

While we always feel you should at least check in on your investments from time to time, let’s go ahead and piece together a portfolio we’d feel pretty comfortable buying and tucking away for the long term.… Read more

Real estate investment trusts (REITs) are simply the best dividend payers you can own right now. These tax loopholes literally “print money” when interest rates fall. So, with Fed Chair Jay Powell signaling that rate easing is on the way, we should load up on real estate dividends.

REITs themselves have flown under cover for years, but “basic” income investors have finally started to wake up to just how effective REITs are. In fact, these income-friendly real estate plays are, quite literally, world beaters.

A Netherlands study examining global assets from 1960 to 2015 found that the top-performing area of the market was not stocks, not bonds, not gold – but real estate investment companies and trusts.… Read more

Most dividend investors understandably love the idea of 10%+ yields. It sure makes retirement easy!

Earn $50,000 per year in dividends alone on a $500K portfolio, or $100,000 annually on a million? Spend your lavish payouts without ever tapping principal? What’s not to like!

Plus, the recent stock market pullback has benefited investors like us because we can snag more dividends for our dollar. Yields are higher overall, and that’s a good thing.

But this strategy is a bit more complicated than simply finding 10% yields and buying them. We must smartly select the stocks that are going to pay our 10%+ dividends securely without tapping their own share prices to pay us.… Read more

Forget the trade war. There’s a bigger danger that too many investors (and especially vulnerable retirees) are ignoring today.

That’s the threat of a snap dividend cut—and the massive damage it can do to your income and your nest egg.

More on that—and 4 imminent dividend cuts you need to dodge now—shortly.

Why I’m Sounding the Alarm

First, there are two reasons why folks are sleepwalking along, wrongly thinking all of their dividends are safe:

• The economy is strong, churning along at a 3.1% rate—lulling most folks to think that only the worst companies would be forced to slash payouts.

• The Fed’s kabuki theater: After being set on raising rates last year, Fed Chair Jerome Powell is signalling a rate cut.

I told you GameStop’s (GME) dividend was toast. Did you sell, or better yet, short the stock?

Just one quarter ago, we chatted about the inevitability of this paper payout ending in tears:

Brick and mortar video game retailer GameStop (GME) is a throwback to yesteryear. It’s survived the rise of digital distribution for video games thus far because Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo haven’t fully digitalized their sales. (In other words, they still sell physical boxes that are bought at stores like GameStop.)

 

But this sales model is ultimately toast and GameStop doesn’t have a convincing second act.

In a word… no.

Interest rates are plummeting, which is usually “prime time” for mREITs like Annaly Capital (NLY). The “original mortgage REIT” has traditionally held fixed-rate securities, which rise in price as rates decline.

Annaly investors remember the “roaring ‘00s” fondly. From 2000 through 2012, mortgage rates ticked down, down, down while the stock climbed higher and higher:

The Roaring ‘00s (and Beyond) for Annaly Investors

While Annaly delivered total returns of 609%, its yield bounced between a handsome 10% and a gaudy 15%. What a run!

Of course, even the best party has its lulls. This happened when then-Fed chair Alan Greenspan began raising rates in the summer of 2004.… Read more