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Today we’re going to head out to one of my favorite hunting grounds for cheap high-yield stocks: the midcap space.

“Wait,” you may be thinking. “Haven’t midcap stocks been on a tear? How can there be any bargains left?”

You’d be right about the first part … but not the second.

To get at why, let’s look at how the benchmark S&P MidCap 400 ETF (MDY) has performed vs. its large-cap cousin, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY) in the past year:

Midcaps Soar…

That rise has had a predictable effect on both funds’ dividend yields (because you calculate yield by dividing the annual dividend into the current share price):

…While Yields Shrink

I know—this still doesn’t make midcaps look like an ideal spot to find bargain high-yielders, but hear me out.… Read more

I get it – you want a diversified portfolio that lets you live off dividends alone. And you probably don’t want to spend most of your waking hours worrying about a million tickers either.

Consider exchange-traded funds (ETFs) then, which provide your portfolio with instant diversification through a single purchase. Pick a strategy you like (ie. high yield) and let the fund do the work for you.

Today we’ll highlight five dirt-cheap ETFs that distribute loads of cash … and let you walk away with the lion’s share of income. Now you and I both know that high fees rob you of returns.… Read more

Let’s say you want to lock in a passive retirement income of $80,000 per year.

If you go with what most investors mistakenly see as the safest route, long-term US Treasuries, you’re going to need $3.3 million. That’s because 10-year Treasuries are paying a wimpy 2.4% interest rate today.

Investors who buy Treasuries often shrug off numbers like that. “So what?” they say, adding that Treasuries are about as low-risk as you can get.

Too bad they’re wrong.

If you buy into Treasuries and want to resell them before they mature—perhaps to deal with a big expense that comes out of nowhere—you have a pretty good chance of losing money.… Read more

The technology sector has long been the growth investor’s best friend, with tomorrow’s innovations fueling the breakneck gains necessary to generate big price returns. Traditionally there hasn’t been much to interest us dividend investors – until now.

Some tech companies have finally grown up. And while their profit growth has slowed, their shareholder returns have actually accelerated. These companies literally make more money than they know what to do with – so they are increasingly dishing it back as dividends.

Here are five tech titans with big cash flows paying yields up to 6%.

Qualcomm (QCOM)
Dividend Yield: 4%

Qualcomm (QCOM) has wandered its way back into 4% yield territory, but right now, the wireless technology specialist is in extremely choppy waters.… Read more

In my last article, I talked about Apple’s (AAPL) destiny as a Dividend Aristocrat. The company doesn’t have even five years’ worth of payouts under its belt, but there are clear indicators that it will never struggle to pay dividends.

In a moment, I’ll show you how you can combine Tim Cook’s company with 3 other stocks and get a 4.6% yield in 10 years or less—and triple-digit upside in the meantime.

First, back to Apple.

The company’s strong—and rising—free cash flow and its operating margin, which has surged over the last 20 years and stayed at historically high levels, indicate that Apple has turned into a cash-producing machine investors should not ignore.… Read more

There are two ways to get big dividends: you can buy stocks that boast high current yields, or you can buy stocks that consistently grow their payouts.

A well-balanced portfolio will include both types of companies, with dividend-growth stocks being the cornerstone of a longer-term income strategy.

Still, investors sometimes get frustrated with dividend growers because to get their outsized payout growth, you often have to settle for a low current yield. And why buy a risky asset that yields 1% when you can get a long-term Treasury that pays 2%?

There are two answers to this question. The first is that Treasuries aren’t risk-free.… Read more

The classic “Dogs of the Dow” strategy advises buying the 10 highest-yielding Dow Jones Industrial Average stocks, then holding onto them for a year. The idea is that higher yields are a signal of a beaten-up share price – and that because we’re buying a stable blue-chip with a stable customer base, investors will eventually bid the stock back up when the business cycle turns up again.

But we can further improve on this effective yet somewhat “dumb” strategy with a bit of second-level analysis. After all, some of these companies have business models that are actually aging in dog years!… Read more

A few weeks ago we discussed how you can make 12% annually, forever, from stocks. Now let’s apply those lessons to 2017, and highlight five that should do even better (17%+ returns) this year (and likely beyond).

Remember, projecting our returns from any given stock is simple. We simply add together the three ways it can pay us:

1. Its current dividend.
2. A future dividend hike.
3. Share repurchases.

It also helps if the stock is inexpensive, as buybacks deliver more bang for management’s buck. So let’s stick with stocks that are dirt-cheap, trading for 10-times free cash flow (FCF) or less for this exercise.… Read more