This 14.4% Dividend Is a New Year’s “Gift” for Contrarians

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This 14.4% Dividend Is a New Year’s “Gift” for Contrarians

2024 is hours from heading out the door, and here’s the state of play:

The Federal Reserve cut interest rates for a third consecutive meeting on December 18. Yet the yield on the 10-year Treasury is now higher than when the easing cycle began.

Wait. What?

The bond market has been screaming at Jay Powell that the job on inflation is not done. It makes sense: The economy is fine. There are plenty of jobs. The market is not hurting for liquidity.

Finally, Jay is catching on. And here’s the twist: The hawkish guidance he gave on rates at that December 18 meeting—including the Fed’s expectation of two rate cuts next year instead of four—could actually set the stage for a top in the 10-year Treasury yield.… Read more

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7 Wild REIT Yields (up to 15%!) for 2025

Need more dividend yield in 2025? Consider real estate investment trusts (REITs), which were literally mandated to be dividend-paying machines. Income is the point—by law.

Select REITs even yield 10% or more. What a payout! We’ll discuss seven of them—and their prospects for 2025—in a moment.

Now we can’t just blindly pick any ol’ a REIT. The real estate sector—using the Real Estate Select Sector SPDR (XLRE) as a proxy—only pays 3% right now.

But the average yield among this REIT 7-pack is 12.4%. That’s 4x what the sector pays!

That level of income would easily allow us to retire on dividends alone.… Read more

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CEF Deep Dive: The One “Profit Indicator” Everyone Gets Wrong

The other day, we broke down how return of capital (ROC) can be both good and bad for investors in 8%+ yielding closed-end funds (CEFs). But in the case of high-quality CEFs, ROC is, contrary to what most people think, a good thing.

Today we’re going to look at some real-world examples to explain how, in fact, return of capital can make up a large share of a fund’s returns.

To do so, we’re going to go into five Nuveen funds, the Nuveen S&P 500 Buy-Write Income Fund (BXMX), Nuveen Dow 30 Dynamic Overwrite Fund (DIAX), Nuveen S&P 500 Dynamic Overwrite Fund (SPXX), Nuveen NASDAQ 100 Dynamic Overwrite Fund (QQQX) and Nuveen Core Equity Alpha Fund (JCE).… Read more

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These Misunderstood 8.7% Yielders Are Top Buys for 2025

The thing most people love about closed-end funds (CEFs) is, well, pretty straightforward: the dividends! With these income plays kicking out average yields of 8.7%, they really can go a long way to helping us secure a safe retirement.

Beyond that, though, there are many other reasons why CEFs should be in your portfolio. Access to a collection of high-quality assets, for example, since CEFs are well-regulated and hold a wide range of assets, including stocks, bonds and real estate investment trusts (REITs).

Still, with yields that high, it’s fair to wonder if CEFs’ payouts might not be sustainable over the long haul, especially since S&P 500 index funds yield just 1.3%.… Read more

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Our Christmas Gift: A 7.9% Tax-Free Dividend Plus 8% Discount

Merry Christmas, my fellow contrarian! Did Santa bring you a tax-advantaged dividend this morning?

The municipal bonds funding the Las Vegas Valley Nevada Water District would have made a great stocking stuffer. They yield 5% and get a tax hall pass from Uncle Sam. Which means on a tax equivalent basis they actually pay 6% or 7% or more, depending on your income tax bracket.

Vegas is booming. And the town is in the middle of a hot desert that is increasingly arid, so this muni is rock solid.

Five percent, tax free. Why’d you forget this, Santa?

Well fear not, my fellow “naughty lister.”… Read more

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Trump 2.0 Is Nearly Here. These Are the 2 Dividends to Buy

I think it’s clear by now that Trump 2.0 is going to look different from Trump 1.0.

Some areas, like tariffs, look similar to the first time around (though we expect more of them in the second term). Others are totally different. (Hands up if you had a potential crackdown on processed food by an RFK Jr.-led HHS on your bingo card.)

“Big Food” to Take a Hit, Fertilizer Stocks a Smart Buy in Trump 2.0

Let’s start with food stocks, which, as mentioned, are now a target for RFK Jr., should he be confirmed as HHS secretary. To be sure, that’s bad news for General Mills (GIS), which dropped following the election and again when RFK Jr.’s… Read more

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My #1 Income Strategy For 2025 (Safety, 14% Dividends On The Table)

Not many people know this, but if you really want to diversify—deftly balancing and rebalancing to maximize (and protect) your gains, you need to invest in closed-end funds (CEFs).

Doing this with CEFs, which yield around 8% on average, gives you two key advantages:

First, you get a much bigger income stream. That’s great on its own. But if you’re reinvesting your income, you get an even bigger edge because you can easily redirect your dividends from one CEF to another in a different sector. You just can’t do this with an index fund.

Let’s dig into how that works in practice.… Read more

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This 7-CEF Portfolio Yields 14.1%

The suits on Wall Street will say that $460K isn’t enough to retire on.

Well, that “modest” nest egg will earn $64,860 in dividends alone when invested in this simple 7-CEF portfolio.

CEFs are the code name for closed-end funds. They are a lesser-known cousin to exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and mutual funds. CEFs tend to have modest assets under management. Which is their superpower. Fewer assets mean greater yields!

Consider the 7-CEF portfolio we are about to discuss versus the standard high-yield stock benchmark ETF:

There is no comparison! But before we buy blindly, let’s do our homework and make sure these CEFs are not paper payout tigers.… Read more

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How to Protect Yourself From a Crash and Get 11% a Year (Paid Monthly)

As I write this, the S&P 500 is sitting on a 28% total return for 2024. And of course, that could shoot even higher if we get the traditional Santa Claus rally.

Obviously, that’s been great for the equity funds we hold in CEF Insider, which give us price gains from their stock holdings, of course—but they also give us a huge slice of our gains in cash, thanks to their outsized yields.

But at times like this, we do need to take a step back and consider what’s going on behind a historic gain like this. While corporate earnings are rising, they’re doing so more slowly than stock prices, which is why the S&P 500’s price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio is 28, as of this writing, nearly double its long-term average of 16.1.… Read more

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My “Made for 2025” Dividend Plan for 25%+ Returns

I’d like to share my simple “Made for 2025” Dividend Plan with you. It’s a simple, safe strategy that identifies dividend stocks with payouts set to surge higher.

As these divvies pop, so do their associated stock prices.

The truth is, this proven system works no matter what the economy, or the Fed (or even the executive branch of the federal government!) is doing. It’s the path to peppy price gains from protected payers.

Let’s talk about a timely example—a dividend dip to enjoy! On the campaign trail, President-Elect Trump presented us with a pullback in perennial dividend grower Deere & Co (DE) thanks to these comments:

“They’ve announced a few days ago that they are going to move a lot of their manufacturing business to Mexico.

… Read more

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