Dividend-paying stocks are as close to a “no-brainer” investment as they come. #-ad_banner-#You only need to look back at the last four decades to see just how smart having your money in these income producing machines has been. According to a 42-year study by Ned Davis Research, from 1972 through December 2013, U.S.-based dividend stocks in the S&P 500 returned 9.3% a year on average — far exceeding the 2.3% annual return for S&P stocks that didn’t pay dividends. There’s just one problem with them right now. As dividend stocks have attracted more and more money over the… Read More

Dividend-paying stocks are as close to a “no-brainer” investment as they come. #-ad_banner-#You only need to look back at the last four decades to see just how smart having your money in these income producing machines has been. According to a 42-year study by Ned Davis Research, from 1972 through December 2013, U.S.-based dividend stocks in the S&P 500 returned 9.3% a year on average — far exceeding the 2.3% annual return for S&P stocks that didn’t pay dividends. There’s just one problem with them right now. As dividend stocks have attracted more and more money over the past few years, there’s concern that some have become overvalued. I showed readers quite a few of these widely-held, yet overvalued dividend payers in a recent article. And one of our income investing experts — Amy Calistri, Chief Investment Strategist for StreetAuthority’s newsletter, The Daily Paycheck — first wrote about this troubling trend (along with a few more overvalued dividend stocks she found) over a year ago: Valuations of defensive dividend-paying stocks have become downright lofty. The irony, of course, is that the overcrowding in these “safe”… Read More

Bar none, they’re the most elite dividend stocks on Earth. #-ad_banner-#Valued at over $3 billion each, these mega-sized blue-chip companies have managed to pay out dividends for decades. Some have paid a dividend for the past century or even longer. But to earn their coveted status, they’ve had to increase their dividend every year for the past 25 years. And to keep the status, they have to keep paying a larger dividend every year from now on — no easy feat. That’s why only 54 out of the 500 stocks in the S&P 500 have made the cut. Read More

Bar none, they’re the most elite dividend stocks on Earth. #-ad_banner-#Valued at over $3 billion each, these mega-sized blue-chip companies have managed to pay out dividends for decades. Some have paid a dividend for the past century or even longer. But to earn their coveted status, they’ve had to increase their dividend every year for the past 25 years. And to keep the status, they have to keep paying a larger dividend every year from now on — no easy feat. That’s why only 54 out of the 500 stocks in the S&P 500 have made the cut. Appropriately, Standard & Poor’s calls this select group of stocks “Dividend Aristocrats.”  And they’re about the finest dividend stocks money can buy. You already know many of these stocks. They are big-name, cash-rich companies like 3M, Clorox, Exxon Mobil, Wal-Mart, Target, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola  and others.  Some investors write these stocks off, thinking that big companies are old news and are done growing. And for many large companies, that may be true.  But not for this group.  Since the index was first introduced in 1989 by Standard & Poor’s, the Dividend Aristocrats have handily outpaced the S&P 500 Index, as you… Read More

They’re some of the hottest stocks on the market.  #-ad_banner-#Since the start of this year, more than 200 of them are beating the S&P 500. I’m not talking about bank stocks, IPOs, tech stocks, private equity… or even anything speculative, for that matter.  In fact, in the past these stocks have been called the most boring stocks on the market. They were once thought of as investments exclusively for widows and orphans. But overlook them now, and you’ll probably miss out on some of the market’s best yields and returns. I’m talking about dividend-paying stocks. And their popularity… Read More

They’re some of the hottest stocks on the market.  #-ad_banner-#Since the start of this year, more than 200 of them are beating the S&P 500. I’m not talking about bank stocks, IPOs, tech stocks, private equity… or even anything speculative, for that matter.  In fact, in the past these stocks have been called the most boring stocks on the market. They were once thought of as investments exclusively for widows and orphans. But overlook them now, and you’ll probably miss out on some of the market’s best yields and returns. I’m talking about dividend-paying stocks. And their popularity is gaining in this era of volatility and low-interest rates. It’s not hard to see why investors love dividend stocks. One only needs to look at their performance record over the past four decades.  According to a 42-year study by Ned Davis Research, from 1972 through December 2013, U.S.-based dividend stocks in the S&P 500 returned 9.3% a year on average — far exceeding the 2.3% annual return for S&P stocks that didn’t pay dividends. To put that in perspective, if you had invested $10,000 in S&P 500 dividend-payers back in 1972, your investment would have grown to a whopping… Read More

We wish we had known about this sooner. Bar none, it’s the easiest and most effective way to collect thousands from investment property. You don’t need a five-figure bank account, have great credit or even work with a real estate agent to become a successful landlord anymore. The best part… Read More

Editor’s note: Each week, one of our investing experts answers a reader’s question in a Q&A column at our sister site, InvestingAnswers.com. It’s all part of our mission to help consumers build and protect their wealth through education. This week’s question… Read More

Editor’s note: Each week, one of our investing experts answers a reader’s question in a Q&A column at our sister site, InvestingAnswers.com. It’s all part of our mission to help consumers build and protect their wealth through education. This week’s question… Read More

Dividend-paying stocks have been an income investor’s dream for the past few years. While bank certificates of deposit (CDs) and U.S. Treasury bonds have been… Read More

“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.” — Warren Buffett Putting his finger on this difference between price and value in stock investing is essentially what made… Read More

For decades, analysts have heralded small-cap stocks as the real growers in the stock market. And they’re right to some extent; a study that tracked stock returns from 1926 to 2008… Read More

As an investor who loves to simply buy, hold and collect returns from my investments, I usually hate the idea of having to sell one of the stocks in my portfolio.#-ad_banner-# After all,… Read More