You’ve probably noticed a recent uptick in local gasoline prices. I paid $2.29 per gallon this morning, versus $1.99 a few weeks ago. The blame can be pinned squarely on a spike in crude oil following a surprise attack on a Saudi Arabian oil production facility. In case you missed it, here is the short version… On September 14, a salvo of cruise missiles rained down on state-owned Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq facility, crippling infrastructure that handles 5.7 million barrels per day. Government officials were quick to blame Iran for the strike. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo went so far as… Read More

You’ve probably noticed a recent uptick in local gasoline prices. I paid $2.29 per gallon this morning, versus $1.99 a few weeks ago. The blame can be pinned squarely on a spike in crude oil following a surprise attack on a Saudi Arabian oil production facility. In case you missed it, here is the short version… On September 14, a salvo of cruise missiles rained down on state-owned Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq facility, crippling infrastructure that handles 5.7 million barrels per day. Government officials were quick to blame Iran for the strike. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo went so far as to declare the unprovoked attack an overt “act of war,” and the President ordered tightened economic sanctions. About 5% of the world’s entire oil supply passes through this facility, making this one of the biggest supply disruptions on record. Worse than Hurricane Katrina, the Invasion of Kuwait, the Libyan Civil War, and other such events. The surgical strike was designed to inflict heavy damage to key equipment in at least 17 different spots. It remains to be seen how much capacity stays offline and for how long. Benchmark Brent crude prices shot up about 20% in the aftermath, but have… Read More

It’s that time again — where I make an informed prediction on what companies could announce a dividend hike in the coming month.  As a refresher, I scan the market for noteworthy special distributions on the horizon, as well as for potential dividend hikes over the next four to six weeks. I give special attention to outsized double-digit increases and reliable dividend-payers that have been steadily growing payouts for a decade or more. I flag these stocks first for my premium High-Yield Investing readers, and then share them with the public.  Here’s what I’m looking at right now… 1. Starbucks… Read More

It’s that time again — where I make an informed prediction on what companies could announce a dividend hike in the coming month.  As a refresher, I scan the market for noteworthy special distributions on the horizon, as well as for potential dividend hikes over the next four to six weeks. I give special attention to outsized double-digit increases and reliable dividend-payers that have been steadily growing payouts for a decade or more. I flag these stocks first for my premium High-Yield Investing readers, and then share them with the public.  Here’s what I’m looking at right now… 1. Starbucks (NYSE: SBUX) – You gotta love the fall. The air is suddenly crisp and the leaves begin to turn. The World Series gets underway. And cash generators like Starbucks reward their faithful shareholders with dividend hikes. The upscale coffee vendor raised its distributions to $0.25 from $0.20 per share in November 2016 and then to $0.30 in November 2017. Last year’s increase came a bit early (in August), lifting the payout to $0.36 per share. Perhaps management just couldn’t wait to surprise investors. At the time, it upped its capital return program by $10 billion, pledging to return $25 billion… Read More

I spent most of Tuesday morning perusing the U.S. Commerce Department’s August retail sales report. It’s not exactly light reading – I’d prefer a Clive Cussler novel any day. Still, this spending barometer reveals quite a bit about the state of the economy in general and carries broad implications for several of my holdings. #-ad_banner-#While the data can be choppy from month to month, it’s pretty clear that the U.S. consumer is in a good mood right now. Various consumer confidence surveys are giving conflicting readings. Taken together, they suggest attitudes remain upbeat, but with a… Read More

I spent most of Tuesday morning perusing the U.S. Commerce Department’s August retail sales report. It’s not exactly light reading – I’d prefer a Clive Cussler novel any day. Still, this spending barometer reveals quite a bit about the state of the economy in general and carries broad implications for several of my holdings. #-ad_banner-#While the data can be choppy from month to month, it’s pretty clear that the U.S. consumer is in a good mood right now. Various consumer confidence surveys are giving conflicting readings. Taken together, they suggest attitudes remain upbeat, but with a growing level of unease. However, that anxiety has had a negligible impact on the collective pocketbook. Retail expenditures climbed 0.4% in August from the prior month. That might sound tepid. But in a $20 trillion economy, even fractions of a percent equate to billions of additional dollars going into cash registers. The growth rate was also double what economists were expecting (which has been the norm lately). Actual results have overshot economists’ projections in four of the past five months. August’s robust growth comes on top of an upwardly-revised 0.8% increase in July, about three times what the market was… Read More

Suppose you were a job hunter presented with two options: a position offering a flat $50,000 per year with no pay hikes or one starting at $40,000 with a guaranteed 10% raise each year. If you were only a year away from retirement, the first option would make more sense. But for those with a bit longer to go, option number two would be the better deal. Not only will your paycheck grow each year, but it will do so by an increasing amount — $4,000 after the first 12 months, $4,400 after the next 12, and so on. After… Read More

Suppose you were a job hunter presented with two options: a position offering a flat $50,000 per year with no pay hikes or one starting at $40,000 with a guaranteed 10% raise each year. If you were only a year away from retirement, the first option would make more sense. But for those with a bit longer to go, option number two would be the better deal. Not only will your paycheck grow each year, but it will do so by an increasing amount — $4,000 after the first 12 months, $4,400 after the next 12, and so on. After just five years, you would be pulling down about $64,000 per year. And if the base compensation alone didn’t sway you, what if I also mentioned that the second job offer was from a prosperous, growing company that also offered nice incentives such as generous 401(K) matching? I’m guessing that would only reinforce your decision. If this simple analogy makes sense, congratulations — you’re already a step ahead of the yield-hungry crowd and that much closer to financial independence. —Recommended Link— Ground-Breaking interview unveils secret to success with pot trading On September 24 at 1… Read More

Some of you may remember back in June, I wrote about Hoegh LNG Partners (Nasdaq: HMLP), saying it was one of the rare 10%-yielders that was actually worth buying. I didn’t say that lightly. After all, as I frequently tell my High-Yield Investing subscribers, if a stock is yielding double digits, it’s for a reason.  After all, yields go up as prices go down. Logically, if a company were on truly healthy long-term footing, in most cases enough investors would be interested in buying shares to snatch up a healthy yield as the stock sold off on whatever short-term missteps… Read More

Some of you may remember back in June, I wrote about Hoegh LNG Partners (Nasdaq: HMLP), saying it was one of the rare 10%-yielders that was actually worth buying. I didn’t say that lightly. After all, as I frequently tell my High-Yield Investing subscribers, if a stock is yielding double digits, it’s for a reason.  After all, yields go up as prices go down. Logically, if a company were on truly healthy long-term footing, in most cases enough investors would be interested in buying shares to snatch up a healthy yield as the stock sold off on whatever short-term missteps occurred before things get too out of hand. So with this in mind, I thought it would be prudent to check in on HMLP to see where things stand today. HMLP Recap For those of you who missed my previous discussion on HMLP, let’s briefly go over the business model…  Hoegh owns floating storage and regasification units (FSRUs). Basically, these are ships anchored off the coast that have been mounted with regasification equipment. In the simplest terms, they turn liquefied natural gas (LNG) back into a usable product, which is then pumped via pipeline to the shore where it… Read More

There aren’t too many investments in existence that are truly recession-proof. And even fewer are market-proof. U.S. government bonds, especially Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS) and zero-coupon bonds — the hedges I discussed in this article — come quite close to being both. #-ad_banner-#Utilities, despite their reputation for being recession-resistant investments, are not quite there in terms of their portfolio-protection abilities. For one, demand for energy isn’t always steady. Because much of it comes from industrial uses, when a recession hits, overall energy demand usually declines. Furthermore, even a regulated-utility business model — while making these stocks safer — hardly guarantees… Read More

There aren’t too many investments in existence that are truly recession-proof. And even fewer are market-proof. U.S. government bonds, especially Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS) and zero-coupon bonds — the hedges I discussed in this article — come quite close to being both. #-ad_banner-#Utilities, despite their reputation for being recession-resistant investments, are not quite there in terms of their portfolio-protection abilities. For one, demand for energy isn’t always steady. Because much of it comes from industrial uses, when a recession hits, overall energy demand usually declines. Furthermore, even a regulated-utility business model — while making these stocks safer — hardly guarantees growth. Power companies have to contend with regulation, capital expenditures, the costs of maintaining and upgrading our aging infrastructure, the advent of renewable energy, and the additional costs of providing enhanced cybersecurity. But they are indeed safer than much of the rest of the market. Society needs these businesses to always operate, and so the government strives to guarantee that regulated utilities have at least some certainty in their businesses. This is achieved via setting up a regulated return on investment for a regulated utility. Because utilities are largely domestic businesses, their results don’t depend on currency fluctuations. This domestic… Read More

Most self-storage renters intend their units to be a short-term solution. But more often than not, three months turns into six, and then six turns into twelve. Nationwide, the average lease term is approximately 15 months. #-ad_banner-#I’m getting close to that mark myself. When we put our home up for sale, the first move was to de-clutter. So, spare furniture, books, sporting goods and other seldom-used items were crammed into a nearby storage unit. A year later, there is still a “for sale” sign in the front yard – and I’m still writing a check to the storage company each… Read More

Most self-storage renters intend their units to be a short-term solution. But more often than not, three months turns into six, and then six turns into twelve. Nationwide, the average lease term is approximately 15 months. #-ad_banner-#I’m getting close to that mark myself. When we put our home up for sale, the first move was to de-clutter. So, spare furniture, books, sporting goods and other seldom-used items were crammed into a nearby storage unit. A year later, there is still a “for sale” sign in the front yard – and I’m still writing a check to the storage company each month. With 516 storage facilities containing 26 million square feet, CubeSmart (Nasdaq: CUBE) has tens of thousands of renters just like me. And all those rental checks add up. Net income last quarter jumped 28% to $49 million, although a good chunk of that increase came from gains on real estate sales. On an adjusted basis, funds from operation (FFO) climbed 7% to $81 million, or $0.42 per share. CubeSmart opened several new properties during the period, and it usually doesn’t take too long to find renters – occupancy rates continue to hover around 92%. And with monthly rental rates… Read More

As some of you may know, I’ve spent some time over the past couple weeks telling readers about how our Daily Paycheck strategy works.  At its core, the strategy is all about finding the market’s safest, strongest dividend payers and letting them pay you year after year. As I’ve mentioned before, when you look at the data, it’s obvious that dividend-paying stocks are the most reliable way to grow your money in the entire investing universe. But today, I want to go one step further by sharing just one of our 45 income-paying holdings with you. By the time you’re… Read More

As some of you may know, I’ve spent some time over the past couple weeks telling readers about how our Daily Paycheck strategy works.  At its core, the strategy is all about finding the market’s safest, strongest dividend payers and letting them pay you year after year. As I’ve mentioned before, when you look at the data, it’s obvious that dividend-paying stocks are the most reliable way to grow your money in the entire investing universe. But today, I want to go one step further by sharing just one of our 45 income-paying holdings with you. By the time you’re finished reading about it, you’ll not only see why a bigger yield isn’t always necessarily better — but you’ll also see just how rewarding it can be when a company produces a bundle of cash flow and uses a chunk of it to aggressively buy back its own shares… —Recommended Link— Trump Blows Up Twitter… Sends This 5G Stock On The Ride Of Its Life President Trump sent this warning to U.S. telcoms: “Step up your 5G efforts, or get left behind.” Right now, Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T, and others are racing to rollout their 5G… Read More

Once again, our local meteorologists were a little wide of the mark with their forecast last weekend. Waking up to predictions of wind and thunderstorms, I decided to cancel my fishing trip. You can probably guess the rest. There were about four or five raindrops, after which the clouds parted and the sun emerged. So I spent much of the day doing yard work instead. It’s nobody’s fault. Even with the latest instruments and computer models, weather forecasting is still somewhat of a guessing game. The same could be said for financial forecasts involving a company’s future earnings. Numerous capricious… Read More

Once again, our local meteorologists were a little wide of the mark with their forecast last weekend. Waking up to predictions of wind and thunderstorms, I decided to cancel my fishing trip. You can probably guess the rest. There were about four or five raindrops, after which the clouds parted and the sun emerged. So I spent much of the day doing yard work instead. It’s nobody’s fault. Even with the latest instruments and computer models, weather forecasting is still somewhat of a guessing game. The same could be said for financial forecasts involving a company’s future earnings. Numerous capricious variables play into the bottom line, so trying to nail down a forecast with any degree of precision is often a difficult task. Even management (which is in constant discussion with customers and has a birds-eye view of the entire organization) is often a little vague on the details. —Recommended Link— 5G Flaw Exposed: $5 Stock Holds Key To $12 Trillion Opportunity A devastating technical glitch could crush the next generation of wireless technology before it even launches. With trillions of dollars and millions of jobs at stake, one company with the “5G fix” could… Read More

The Federal Reserve’s recent interest rate cut set off another round of reports noting that interest rates are at 5,000-year lows.  Sound crazy? Well take a look at the chart below, which shows the history of rates…  …since 3000 BC.  This is interesting. It shows the highs and lows of world history. In times of global stress, rates generally rose. For example, governments often needed to pay higher interest rates to borrow during wars. The chart below shows the rate the Bank of England paid in the late 1700s.  ​  Source: Bank of England  Rates… Read More

The Federal Reserve’s recent interest rate cut set off another round of reports noting that interest rates are at 5,000-year lows.  Sound crazy? Well take a look at the chart below, which shows the history of rates…  …since 3000 BC.  This is interesting. It shows the highs and lows of world history. In times of global stress, rates generally rose. For example, governments often needed to pay higher interest rates to borrow during wars. The chart below shows the rate the Bank of England paid in the late 1700s.  ​  Source: Bank of England  Rates rose after 1776, as England needed more funds to finance their role in the American Revolution. Rates came down after the war and rose again to fund the Napoleonic Wars in the early 1800s.  This pattern held into the 1900s. Even as the worst conflict in world history raged, interest rates were at historic lows in the 1940s. That’s because the central banks like the Fed worked with governments to hold rates down, making it possible to finance World War II.  The power of central banks has ebbed and flowed over the centuries. For now, the banks seem to be… Read More