When it comes to dividends, any stock yielding more than 10% these days needs to be taken with a grain of salt. That’s because bigger isn’t usually better when you’re talking about dividend yields.

The FOMC has targeted short-term rates of between 1.75% to 2.00% in the U.S. and the yield on the benchmark 10-year note is hovering around 3%. Almost any other income investment can be priced based off these rates, depending on how much extra risk you’re willing to take on.

Historically-speaking, any time a stock is paying more than seven percentage points above the AAA-rated, government-secured debt, investors begin to worry if the dividend could be cut.… Read more

What a year it’s been for oil!

Oil Takes Off

With a 43.5% climb in just a year, oil prices have blown by several technical levels to breach $70, and $80 is on the table by the end of the year.

This is the highest price since 2014, and it’s a very good sign for stocks—which is why you should consider buying 2 funds paying massive dividends and boasting top-notch energy-sector exposure.

(And if you prefer to invest in oil through individual stocks, rather than funds, check out this recent article by my colleague David Peltier.)

Before I show you my 2 energy funds, though, let’s talk a bit about what isn’t happening with oil.… Read more

If you’re looking for tax-free yields, municipal (“muni”) bonds can provide you with 5%+ distributions that Uncle Sam won’t touch. With rates rising, it is a bit tricky to make savvy buying decisions at the moment. But income investors buying smartly today are banking 5%+ yields – and paying as little as 88 cents on the dollar!

For quick profits, it’s best to buy munis after mini-panics. They seem to happen every year or two, presenting us levelheaded contrarians with safe yields for cheap. (Most recently, readers who followed my advice and bought munis after an irrational “tax plan panic” enjoyed total returns up to 16.7% in just 12 months!)… Read more

Once again, almost everyone has gotten sucked in by a tired investor slogan that’s dead wrong—and it’s costing them big gains (and income).

But that’s good news for contrarians like us, because we can bank some easy profits thanks to this all-too-predictable reflex.

That’s especially true now that the Federal Reserve has sent out a blaringly obvious signal that it’s stuck to its rate-hike track, calling the economy “strong” after its latest meeting last week.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Before I go further, the shopworn myth I’m talking about is that REITs nosedive when interest rates rise.

Many folks just can’t be talked out of it, despite all evidence to the contrary, including the fact that REITs skyrocketed during the last sustained rising-rate cycle, in 2004–06.… Read more

If you’ve read the headlines about tech’s woeful slump in the past couple weeks, you might think stocks are out of favor.

You’d be wrong—and this chart proves it:

Forget the Headlines: Stocks Are Rolling

After February’s gut-wrenching plunge, the S&P 500 has more than recovered and is up 6.2% year to date. If this trend continues, we’re looking at a 12.4% return on the year.

But look at the orange line above—that’s the tech-benchmark Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ), which is up 13.2% year to date, even after this latest correction in tech. That adds up to a monstrous 26.4% return for 2018 if that trend continues.… Read more

What do most exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and many blue-chip stocks have in common?

They’re big, they’re popular with Wall Street pundits … and they don’t deliver nearly as much income as investors need to retire.

Not even close.

I want to share some ugly and eye-opening numbers with you about the skinflint ETF industry. I recently dug into the 100 most popular funds by assets under management, and here’s what I found:

• Just one of those 100 funds yields more than 7.7% – my threshold for a truly retirement-sustaining holding.
• Only about a dozen of those funds yield more than 3%.

One popular investing myth is that the market always efficiently prices stocks. The truth is that active traders have a herd mentality, and often push prices to extreme levels in the short term.

That’s when it truly pays to be a contrarian, to be able to buy when prices are down and dividend yields are up.

I believe this is currently the case with energy master limited partnerships (MLPs). Crude oil fell 7% in July, which was its worst monthly performance in two years. Natural gas also declined more than 4%.

However, the two names I’ve found are pipeline and transport firms that have largely fee-based businesses and are not affected by a temporary drop in energy prices.… Read more

120 billion dollars.

That’s how much market cap Facebook (FB) dumped over the side in a single day when the company crushed Wall Street’s hopes with a soft second-quarter earnings report last week.

This was the biggest single-day loss in US stock-market history—and the stock has plunged more since, to a loss of over 20%.

“Facebook Fright” Spreads Like Wildfire

The panic has spread to FAANG land, with Amazon (AMZN), Apple (AAPL), Netflix (NFLX) and Alphabet (GOOG) all showing losses right after Facebook’s report, even though many of these companies have very different business models than Facebook. And the one that’s closest, Alphabet, recently reported a blowout quarter.… Read more

I was not supposed to be sharing my favorite income strategy (for weekly payouts) with you today. But I convinced my publisher to make an exception – so please take advantage of his rare act of leniency and read this carefully today.

As you probably know I’m the rare “income guy” who thinks that these “elevated” Treasury yields are still a joke. As I write, the 10-year IOU from Uncle Sam is rallying back towards 3%. Is anyone who is not already rich retiring off of these yields?

A 3% yield on a $1 million portfolio generates just $30,000 per year before taxes.… Read more

Remember the panic selling in February? It all seems silly now—the economy is surging, companies are beating high earnings expectations and American consumers are more confident than ever.

And the stock market is finally catching on—the S&P 500 is up a solid 5.9% in 2018, and the momentum for stocks to go higher is clearly there.

You’re Not Too Late for the Biggest Profits

The good news? You can get into this raging bull market and still see a lot of upside.

Since the market is still a sliver off its all-time high (which it hit in January, before the plunge), we are nowhere near a top—especially since earnings have soared since then.… Read more