Author Archive: Michael Foster

The financial media is churning out doom-and-gloom stories 24/7—and that’s keeping many folks on the sidelines when they should be buying.

Sure, you could say that about almost any period in history, but it’s especially true in 2017, when stocks have done this:

A Steady Ride Up

Consider this chart for a moment. This gain came during the Russia scandal, the North Korea nuclear threat and environmental and humanitarian disasters caused by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma.

Can you see any of those events in the chart above?

I can’t.

In reality, stocks aren’t political and they’re not emotional. The truth is, they only go up and down if a major news story also has a major financial impact.… Read more

If you’ve been reading my CEF Insider service or my weekly articles on Contrarian Outlook, you know I don’t go near a closed-end fund unless it hands us two things:

1. A fat, sustainable dividend
2. A big discount to net asset value (NAV, or the value of its underlying assets)

Today I’m going to show you 4 CEFs that give us these two things in spades, with safe dividend yields up to 8.2% and ridiculous discounts either at or near double digits! (If you’re unfamiliar with CEFs, click here for a quick overview of these exciting high-yield investments).

So if you’re looking to bag solid dividends up to 8.2% at a nice discount (and who isn’t?),… Read more

Fee-obsessed investors continue to pile into exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

Don’t follow them.

Because there’s another—much less popular—group of funds that will hand you much better returns (and double the dividend payouts). And swapping your ETFs for them is easy.

I’m talking about closed-end funds (CEFs). (If you’re not familiar with CEFs, click here to check out a primer I recently wrote on them.)

Now even though I just said CEFs are less popular than ETFs, that doesn’t mean they’re totally ignored. The truth is, they’re getting more attention from investors of late, for reasons I’ll dive into in just a moment.… Read more

America’s richest investors are earning reams of tax-free income from an investment most people ignore, and today I’m going to let you in on it.

In fact, it’s hardly a secret at all. It’s just sitting there, in plain sight. And it’s very popular with the multi-millionaires and billionaires among us for one reason: as their investments throw off an ever-rising stream of dividends and capital gains, these folks get bumped into higher and higher tax brackets.

That hardly seems fair—and it feels like double taxation. But that’s how the tax system works. And this is where these dull-as-dishwater investments come in.… Read more

Wall Street says you have to settle for the pathetic 2% yields most folks scrape by on from 10-year Treasuries, or your typical S&P 500 stock.

Don’t believe them.

Because there’s a far better way to bankroll your retirement that they won’t tell you about: municipal bonds.

While their name sounds boring, that’s the last word I’d use to describe the income they throw off: “munis” pay dividend yields of 5% and often much more, thanks to a unique tax advantage.

In fact, the 3 off-the-radar plays I’ll show you below can let you pull a steady (and safe) 6.5% out of some of the safest muni bonds out there.… Read more

It’s a whopper many investors believe—you may even be one of them.

It’s simply this: all fees are evil.

After all, the more you shell out to line fund managers’ pockets, the worse your return will be, right?

It sounds right. It makes sense. But it’s totally wrong, particularly when it comes to the world of high-yield closed-end funds, which I’ll get to in a moment.

Truth is, you don’t have to go further than the darlings of “cheap” investing—exchange-traded funds—to see how bogus the so-called “wisdom” on fees is. Check out this chart showing the seven-year performance of two nearly identical ETFs—the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO) and the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY), and keep in mind that VOO has always had lower fees than SPY:

The Cheap Fund Is … the Loser?… Read more

By now you probably either invest in closed-end funds (CEFs) or have heard more folks talking about them.

There’s a good reason why: dividends!

With 10-Year Treasuries yielding barely 1% and your typical S&P 500 stock paying even less—just 1.7%—there’s a very good chance none of the folks you know are clocking dividends that can even beat inflation, let alone provide a decent income stream!

So when an investment comes along throwing off yields of 7%, 9% … even 11%, people take notice.

In a moment, I’ll show you exactly why these outsized yields exist—and how to grab a slice of this cash for yourself.… Read more

With stocks looking choppy—and toppy—and more chaos flowing out of DC seemingly every day, you may be pondering taking some money off the table these days.

I have one word for you.

Don’t.

Because as I wrote on August 10, US companies are killing it on the earnings front, and that great-news story is getting completely lost in the breathless coverage of Trump’s latest tweet and saber rattling from North Korea.

At times like these, it’s best to remember the words of the world’s most successful investor, Warren Buffett: “Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.”… Read more

After months of grinding higher, stocks have taken a bit of a breather. And one obscure corner of the market went lower still.

I know I don’t have to tell you that when that happens, contrarians like us are set up for some nice gains, so long as we don’t let emotion cloud our judgment.

And there are indeed some nice gains on tap with 3 cheap funds I’ll tell you about shortly. They’re all closed-end funds, a special kind of investment that throws off eye-popping dividend yields (one of the 3 CEFs I’ll show you yields a hefty 9.3% now!).… Read more

If you’ve held Apple (AAPL) for a long time, you’re probably feeling pretty smug. And you should—the stock is way up over just about any time period and has nearly doubled in the last five years:

Apple’s Sparkling Performance

Clearly, Apple is an amazing stock. But what if I told you we can top that 96.3% gain in the next five years?

All we have to do is go someplace most investors aren’t. I’m talking about high-yielding—and almost totally ignored—closed-end funds.

The three I want to show you today are the PIMCO Dynamic Income Fund (PDI), the Tekla Life Sciences Investors Fund (HQL) and the Western Asset Mortgage Defined Opportunity Fund (DMO).… Read more