just another Fido Forum refugee .....

[fjpajerski]

I am an aged retired-in-2004 passive-but-not-yet-comatose income-investor focused on high-yield FI CEFs (IRA-Rollover) and BDCs (IRA-Roth) in a buy-and-monitor non-trading manner. The CEF account priority is a monthly cash distribution (at 11%+ on cost) nicely in excess of normal living expenses. I'm (heresy!) all in on these, sleeping very comfortably (even right now) with a fairly steady income from this and even some growth at times despite their requirements to distribute almost all earnings. Some swings down (such as with CLO equities) don't bother me, especially when they then swing up.

At this stage of life with advancing age and declining health, there's little of personal interests to report here, just much less travel and concerts and dinners and more time around the house reading, watching (good!) movies, and listening to music. And online-chess has replaced the tennis courts for me, too. My forum-interest here is investing in this narrow spectrum which suits me. As I struggle for more time away from the computer and from social media, the wide range of interesting material that I see here (and could spend all day on) is quite troublesome. I don't post often, there's usually someone more informed more quick on this than me as well as that I have no wish to just type something just to chatter away with someone.

Looking back, I was an active equity growth chaser beginning with the Nifty-Fifty and Go-Go funds of the late '60s, and then there were various small funds from various small boutique shops and overall far too much time and worry spent on some gains and some losses in doing all this. It took a while for CapeCod's info on FI investing some years ago in the M* forum to germinate in me, but now I am financially comfortable without expending much time/worry to be so.

And to drone on .... coming from a technical background (data center support and management beginning at NASA-GSFC in 1966), I have received necessary education/help in FI CEF and BDC investing by postings from the esteemed Cape gentleman, and articles from a few SeekingAlpha analysts (primarily ADS Analytics (and its service too), Stanford Chemist, Nick Ackerman, and Steven Bavaria). I also have to note the SA commenter Bekster who offers the most detailed and informative BDC info in a very civil manner.

Here's my lineup: Peculiar to me is that I like having just seven or eight holdings in the account.
FI CEFs ... ARDC, DMO, KIO, OXLC, PAXS, PDO, PFN, WDI
BDCs ... ARCC, BCSF, BXSL, CGBD, FDUS, GBDC, OBDC

--- Frank

 

[DuluthGA]

Welcome. another CEF/Bavaria fan here. I’ve got several of yours. I started with WDI and have done real well and started looking at others and found Bavaria. OXLC has been really nice too!

 

[CaliKid]

Welcome aboard! We are formerly of "near Sacramento."

I appreciate your post. For some reason I haven't heard about this high yield options before the past week. They sound interesting.

 

[COcheesehead]

Mootsie from the old Fidelity board here. Welcome!

 

[Bill E]

Hi. Bill here. Also from the Fidelity Forum - and Morningstar before that.

Investments are primarily in closed end funds (largely Pimco) - after being introduced to them by Dickoncapecod years ago.

My career was hospital management consulting. I'm located in the PNW where I manage a small family forest as my main retirement occupation besides filling in as my wife's 'ranch hand.'

Happy to find you here!

 

[Ozz]

Welcome Bill, Oz from Fido.

 

[skyking1]

welcome all. Ranch hand and forest manager are noble jobs of work, Bill.
One of my favorite little drives is the Preston-Fall City road.

 

[Bill E]

Welcome Bill, Oz from Fido.

Hi Oz!

 

[Bill E]

welcome all. Ranch hand and forest manager are noble jobs of work, Bill.
One of my favorite little drives is the Preston-Fall City road.

Thanks. I know the road well! What kind of plane?

 

[skyking1]

Thanks. I know the road well! What kind of plane?

that's my picture of a Thunder Mustang. I fly ( flew ) C310 and C175/180hp banner tow, among others.

 

[dickoncapecod]

Welcome aboard, Frank.
Regards, Dick

 

[pacergal]

Welcome to the forum, it's a great place to be. Hope to hear more from you.
No worries about "chatter(ing) away"--we do that very well! You will be surprised at how quickly some topics get side tracked here, its all in good fun and makes life interesting

 

[Flute McG]

Welcome!

Flute

 

[aja8888]

I'm not from the Fido forums but here anyway and look forward to all you new members providing recommendations and strategy on income investing. I'm an old fart and need to sleep well at night so worrying about equity moves is not in my wheelhouse as much anymore.

 

[Out-to-Lunch]

Welcome aboard!

 

[GBcycling]

Hey Frank, Welcome!

gb from FF

 

[Koolau]

Frank, you are most welcome here. Thanks for sharing your name as I can't pronounce your screen name.

 

[DrRoy]

Following

 

[eniacpalm]

Eniac here from Fido

 

[street]

Great to have you here and more importantly your contributions as well.

 

[Flieger]

Welcome! I have a few of the CEF's and BDC's that you are carrying as well. I have 24 total funds in the Income side of my Portfolio (working my way toward that being 65% of the total Portfolio). Look forward to you, dickoncapecod, and some others that are "Income Investors" sharing experience and suggestions. I recently retired (Sept 2024) and changed my focus from Growth to Income. TIA for sharing info (and hopefully) mistakes made to avoid!

Flieger

 

[surprising]

Just an observation here, but for a long time I seemed to be one of the very few vocal people who owned CEFs here for income and when I mentioned it, reactions were pretty muted. Now there seems to be a flood of people with CEFs and several threads on income investing with them. What changed? Is the selloff in the market causing people to look for more reliable income? I've noticed my CEF/BDC/REIT portfolio has been pretty stable, if not rising, in this market, so I'm pretty happy I can wait it out with reliable income stream while the market sorts itself out.

 

[Tacitus]

Just an observation here, but for a long time I seemed to be one of the very few vocal people who owned CEFs here for income and when I mentioned it, reactions were pretty muted. Now there seems to be a flood of people with CEFs and several threads on income investing with them. What changed? Is the selloff in the market causing people to look for more reliable income? I've noticed my CEF/BDC/REIT portfolio has been pretty stable, if not rising, in this market, so I'm pretty happy I can wait it out with reliable income stream while the market sorts itself out.

@surprising
A bunch from Fidelity have moved here. , Recent post has Fidelity refugee #17 , apparently many are very strong advocates of debt cefs. They have left their Fidelity forum-which was evidently redesigned and messed up- and landed here, some coalescing and now a new CEF sticky thread. Welcome. I like some cefs too, happy to see the sticky thread. My first cef was PCN decade or so ago. Question for you, "Surprising". Will use PDI as example which I own. Will try adding snippet at end.

As can see its price and nav fell off cliff in March 2020 and after slight recovey again in June 2021. Latter before Fed started aggressively raising rates in March 2022 but perhaps investors anticipating. So did you get crushed during this period or trade in and out? I like it now and overall fat dividends throughout but wondering how perhaps a long term objective investor of these vehicles dealt with them? Oh and also what percentage of your total portfolio are debt cefs? Thanks for any feedback you may offer. I like owning for now but worry about the next cliff.

 

[COcheesehead]

Just an observation here, but for a long time I seemed to be one of the very few vocal people who owned CEFs here for income and when I mentioned it, reactions were pretty muted. Now there seems to be a flood of people with CEFs and several threads on income investing with them. What changed? Is the selloff in the market causing people to look for more reliable income? I've noticed my CEF/BDC/REIT portfolio has been pretty stable, if not rising, in this market, so I'm pretty happy I can wait it out with reliable income stream while the market sorts itself out.

I think it depends on the members. CEFs have been a stable discussion on the Fidelity board for years.

 

[Flieger]

Just an observation here, but for a long time I seemed to be one of the very few vocal people who owned CEFs here for income and when I mentioned it, reactions were pretty muted. Now there seems to be a flood of people with CEFs and several threads on income investing with them. What changed? Is the selloff in the market causing people to look for more reliable income? I've noticed my CEF/BDC/REIT portfolio has been pretty stable, if not rising, in this market, so I'm pretty happy I can wait it out with reliable income stream while the market sorts itself out.

While my portfolio (with a mix of CEF, BDC, CC and other higher yielding ETF's) has done better than the overall S&P or Nasdaq, it certainly has not been stable or rising. I'd be interested in knowing what your portfolio is consisting of that is rising at the moment? I guess I have had a few (FSCO, ARCC, EICC as a couple of examples), but in the aggregate I have still lost basis. So far, Divs have held up...

Here's snapshot of Portfolio vs same mix in S&P or Nasdaq. Less volatile, but still down in the last month:

Flieger