This “Can’t Miss” Investment Promised a 25% Yield, Then Collapsed 98%

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One of the worst disasters to befall investors in this crisis was something called the MORL dividend.

MORL is—or rather was—the ticker for the ETRACS Monthly Pay 2XLeveraged ETN (MORL). What’s MORL? It’s a double-leveraged bank-issued note designed to track the MVIS Global Mortgage REITs Index, a market-cap-weighted global mortgage-REIT index.

A mouthful, right?

But the jargon and obscure nature of this investment didn’t stop a lot of people from buying in. The reason was simple: MORL yielded as much as 25% back in March.

Think about that for a minute: a 25% dividend. Hold MORL for just four years and you’d get your entire investment back in cash payouts without selling a single share.… Read more

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If you’re a dividend fan and you spot an 18% yield, you’re going to sit up and take notice.

But your radar will also probably go up for another reason: you know outsized payouts like that pretty much always come with outsized risk too.

Which brings me to the weird funds I’m going to show you today.

Their 18% average yield masks something shocking: they’re not only dangerous but they’re not even income investments! They’re something else entirely—and if you fail to pick up on that and buy, they could blow a hole in your retirement portfolio.

Let me explain, starting with…

Where We Found These 18% Payouts

The funds I’m talking about are called exchange-traded notes (ETNs), a close cousin of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), another asset class I recommended staying clear of in a September 12 article.…
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