The first week of March hasn’t brought as many dividend increases as we’ve seen in recent weeks but any increases are welcome news to income investors in this day and age. Wal-Mart is the highest profile company raising its dividend this week, and several notable gas companies have also increased their dividends.

General Shares

Southwest Gas Corp. (SWX), a supplier of natural gas to Arizona, Nevada and California, has increased its dividend 5.3% to $0.25 per share. This gives a new yield of 3.38%. The Andersons (ANDE), agriculture and transportation operators, has increased its quarterly dividend 3% to $0.09, leaving their new yield at a measly 1.08%. Hanover Insurance (THG), a provider of insurance and other financial products, has raised its dividend a generous 33%, giving a payout of $0.25 and a new yield of 2.34%. Similarly to Hanover Insurance, Fred’s (FRED) has increased its dividend 33% giving a new payout of $0.04 a share, and a yield of 1.50% based on this payout.
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Investing in dividend stocks is a great way to make a passive income, but how does one choose which stocks to invest in? Half the battle is in knowing what to look for, and we’ll try to cover the basics of that here.

Yield

If you’re investing in dividend paying stocks, the first thing you are going to look at when considering a particular company’s stock is its dividend yield. Annual yield can be calculated by taking the annual dividend (for example, if the dividend is paid quarterly you multiply it by four to get your annual dividend) then divide it by the current share price. (more…)

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This week has seen another stunning amount of dividend increases for large US companies with 18 companies reporting increases. US economic data has suggested that the economy is starting to grow at a faster pace, and it seems that, maybe, these companies are looking towards a better year and can afford to increase their dividends to attract investment, or alternatively rewarding investors who stayed with them through the ‘rough patch’. Read Complete Article

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We are only two-thirds of the way through February, and there has already been a large amount of dividend increases. In particular, over twenty notable companies raised their dividends in the second week of February alone, bringing the total number of dividend-raisers up to around 30 for the first three weeks of February. In the same period last year, the majority of companies were maintaining, or some even reducing, their dividend payouts after the ‘big crash’. Here we shall take a look at some notable increases, and ponder what the increases the last week of February will bring for income investors. Read Complete Article

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Many of us own stocks through retirement portfolios or in our own market speculation, but very few are capitalizing and generating any income on stocks that they already own.

Covered calls are a relatively new idea to many investors mostly because they’ve never heard of them. Covered calls are simply stock options that you sell on shares of stock that you already own. By writing your own options, you’ll be able to sell stock options and pocket the premium for each.

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Although the smoke signals of a potential recession are still not definitive, it is clear that our economy has slowed down. With the volatility in the equities market, many investors are holding their funds on the sidelines. However, instead of simply placing your portfolio funds into a low-earning CD, there are several investments that have the potential to grow, even through a recession.

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As most of you have noticed, most securities pay their dividends quarterly. But those who take the time to find and invest in securities that pay their dividends monthly have a slight advantage.

Investing in securities that pay their dividends monthly as opposed to quarterly can give you an edge over time.

Advantages if you are reinvesting your dividends

For those who are reinvesting their dividends, monthly payments as opposed to quarterly dividend payments will make a very small difference in the short term, but over the long run the deference will become bigger. By taking advantage of the power of compounding, monthly dividend reinvestments will grow at a faster rate as opposed to getting that same dividend quarterly.
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Stock markets got you down?

Research shows that most investors are more depressed when they are loosing money, then happy when they are making money. Psychology plays a big part in investing and getting past your initial desire to get out, in a panic driven market, can go a long way over the long run. Many investors wind up buying high and selling low because they panicked and sold at or near the bottom. But what if they where buying in a correction instead of panic selling?

Many investors feel like they should have moved more money into cash before the markets started selling off and then repurchae their shares at a lower price, or that they should have held off on that investment a little longer until prices were even more attractive. It can be incredibly frustrating. But one cannot time the markets (at least not without a working time machine) and trying to do so will only loose you money. Instead we should all have a good strategy for dealing with market corrections, and taking advantage of hidden oportunities to build wealth.

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There are many income investors who look for monthly dividend payments in order to support their retirement income. Other investors who are not yet close to retirement want monthly dividends for faster compounding in their IRAs or other investment accounts.

The following is a list of more than 200 different stocks, REITs, CEFs, oil income funds, Canadian royalty trusts and floating rate funds, which pay their dividends monthly. All of these securities trade on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) or American Stock Exchange (AMEX). This list is sorter by yield with the highest at the top. Canadian companies are identified [Canada] because of their tax withholding issues.
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Since my investment objective is to generate a passive income stream from various investments, I tend to look at those securities (stocks, funds, ETF’s) that pay a healthy dividend. One interesting and promising approach to dividend investing is a mutual fund that sticks out from all the rest, the Alpine Dynamic Dividend Fund (ADVDX) managed by Jill Evans and Kevin Shacknofsky of Alpine Funds. It is a unique mutual fund in that a part of it’s strategy is something called dividend rotation, which allows for the funds 13.57% annual yield, far greater than any other dividend oriented equities in my portfolio. In addition to rotation, the fund also invests globally in stocks that pay special dividends by, again, applying the technique to buy the stock at the right time to collect the high dividend payout. ADVDX is a well run fund that has truly reinvented the process at going after all the dividend income they can.
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