Income-focused investors love big-yield bond CEFs because of their large distributions payments, often paid monthly. But if you’ve been following along, you know most of them (i.e. the popular PIMCO and BlackRock bond CEFs) have been feeling a lot of pain over the last year (because as rates have gone up, bond prices have gone down). Granted some investors don’t care about price as long as the income keeps rolling in, but it really does matter. In this report, we provide an update on three popular Bond CEFs (two from PIMCO and one from BlackRock), and share our views on whether the interest rate environment is signaling an “all clear” sign. We conclude with our strong opinion on investing.
Bond CEFs: Prices, Premiums and Interest Rates
A quick note to share some updated data and commentary on a handful of popular big-yield bond CEFs from PIMCO and BlackRock. This note may be of particular interest to those following our High Income NOW portfolio. For starters, here is a look at the latest movement in premiums and discounts (versus NAV).
Skip UTG: Two Better Big-Dividend CEFs
Closed-End Funds (or CEFs) are often an income-investor favorite because they can pay large distribution yields. However, CEFs come in many different shapes and sizes. One very popular CEF, The Reaves Utility Income Fund (UTG), has performed very well this year, but in this article we argue that it’s time to stop adding money to UTG because there are currently better CEF opportunities available. We will review two specific attractive CEFs (that we currently prefer over UTG) in this report.
8.7% Yield Bond CEF: Max Interest Rate Pain, Taper Tantrum Looms
As the Fed continues on its path of aggressive interest rate increases (to tame inflation), infamous growth stock investor, Cathie Wood, says “equities and bonds seem to be warning the Fed that its policy measures could cause an economic and/or financial crisis.” Both stock and bond markets are down sharply this year (largely in response to the Fed), but there are reasons to believe things could be about to change (for example, high inflation rates could still prove somewhat transitory thereby making the Fed more receptive to the market’s growing taper tantrum), and now may be an attractive time to consider investing in select high-yield bond CEFs. In this report, we review one in particular that is increasingly attractive.
Helicopter Fed: Top 10 mREITs and Bond CEFs (Huge Yields, Discounted Prices)
This article shares our Top 10 compelling mREITs and Bond CEFs. They trade at significant discounts to their book values and are being supported, to varying degrees, by the actions of the US Fed. The Fed is pumping an unlimited amount of liquidity into the system by buying the types of bonds these compelling mREITs and CEFs own.
3 Blue Chips For Strong Income, Plus Price Appreciation
One of our favorite long-time members (HB from Texas) recently asked “If you had to pick two or three securities for primarily income, but good candidates for capital growth, which would they be?” He mused REITs, MLPs, preferred stocks and bonds. For your consideration, this article includes three blue chip ideas that we consider attractive right now because of their strong income, as well as their potential for healthy price appreciation to boot.
PCI: Attractive 8.6% Yield, But Know The Big Risks
The PIMCO Dynamic Credit and Mortgage Income Fund (PCI) is an attractive CEF for a variety of reasons (including its big 8.6% yield and discounted price versus NAV). However, a look under the hood shows that PCI is exposed to some very big risks. This article provides an overview of the fund, reviews the big risks investors may want to consider, and concludes with our opinion about investing in PCI.
Attractive High-Income Closed-End Funds
This article details multiple attractive opportunities to capture >6%+ yields. And because these attractive income opportunities are all CEFs, they offer investors a little something extra in terms of their currently discounted prices versus their NAVs. If you're an income-focused investor, these CEFs are worth considering.