Informed Investing

8 sources: II Forge #236 (REITs now yield 1.57 points less than the 10-year, the lowest gap in 21 years, and the 'cheap REIT' signal did no better than a coin toss over 16 years); TIKR on Kraft Heinz vs J.M. Smucker; TIKR on Exxon vs Chevron (44 and 39 straight years of raises); TIKR on a 72-year-old's $500K in PepsiCo, Nike and Bristol Myers Squibb; 24/7 Wall St. on PepsiCo's 1,000 job cuts and a...

8 sources: II Forge #235 (0K into a $160K rental vs $40K in VNQ or O/NNN/ADC on DRIP — the house won every window after costs and taxes, but bought at today's rates it would lose about $174/month); Dividend Stockpile with GraniteShares CEO Will Rhind on YieldBOOST's switch to a 95/90 put spread; Viktoriya M Finance on Invesco's new defensive high-income ETF vs JEPQ/GPIQ/SPYI/QQQI; ChannelVest on S...

8 sources: II Forge #221 (SCHD owns none of the Mag 7, DGRW is 26% them; SCHD led since the October high but SPY beat all five dividend funds every year 2023-2025 and SCHD finished last each year); Permission To Be Wealthy on whether QQQI (down 7%) is eroding; Doug The Retirement Guy on QQQI vs TDAQ vs GPIQ; TIKR on Exxon vs Altria for 10 years; $100K Dividend on Altria's ~6% yield and ~77% payout...

8 sources: II Forge #231 (QQQI kept 69% of QQQ's net gain since the March low, the 1.5x XQQI kept 87% after taking 129% of the fall; since launch XQQI 47% vs QQQI 56%; TDAX vs TDAQ); Doug The Retirement Guy on FTQI; Motley Fool on SCHD's $100/month buy-and-hold math; TIKR on the $51,991 a single 62-year-old must withdraw to net $4,000/month in 2027 and the ACA 400% cliff; TIKR on Exxon vs Pfizer f...

8 sources: II Forge #223 (11 Nasdaq-100 income ETFs vs QQQ through the 2026 rally and October drop; JEPQ 62% up/77% down, only FTQI had a cushion bigger than its cap); Doug The Retirement Guy's top-8 Nasdaq-100 monthly income ETFs; Simply Safe Dividends on 863 dividend stocks vs the AI crash; Dapper Dividends on whether ARCC's 10% dividend gets cut; Dividend Bull on 12% yielders that never cut; Ma...

8 sources: II Forge #227 crash-day scorecard (tech fell, REITs/BDCs held on 11/5; the cushion failed in 2020 and 2022); Motley Fool's 3 stocks yielding triple the S&P 500 (PEP and others); Dividend Informer on the midterm 'gridlock dividend'; Viktoriya M Finance on Fidelity dividend ETFs; Rico Nasol on a new 12% income ETF vs QQQI; Dividend Diplomats on a 6% yielder that jumped 15%; Doug The R...

8 sources: II Forge #161 GPIQ teardown (91% vs 105% for the Nasdaq-100 over 3 years, ~1.7-pt drawdown cushion, ROC); Dividend Growth Investing (Jake) on starting a GPIQ position; Stock Market Beast on why he stopped buying SPYI & QQQI; Morningstar's 3 best dividend stocks to own (BMY, DUK, PG); Quality at a Fair Price on the Yieldr 4-factor dividend growth strategy; Dividends Paradise on the 7...

8 sources: II Forge #226 testing the 'no NAV erosion' claim on QDVO, QQQI and DIVO (share price fell further than QQQ into the Mar. 30 low and gained about half as much in the rally, plus the Recovery Clock); Darth Dividend's 'no NAV erosion' options-income ETFs video; Viktoriya M on Fidelity's new high-income ETF vs covered-call funds; Motley Fool on 5 payment stocks (V, MA, AXP, PYPL, COF); ETF...

8 sources: II Forge #225 testing a 6.8% SCHD-core portfolio (SCHD 35% + GPIQ/UTF/MPLX/MAIN and REITs) vs SCHD alone — +1 pt/yr over GPIQ's 3 real years, a tie over 9.6 years, a harder 2020 drop; TIKR on UPS (7.1%, 99% FCF payout) vs Target (3.1%, 46%); Rico Nasol on a 9% S&P 500 covered-call fund vs SPYI; Doug the Retirement Guy on OVL vs OVQ; Dividend Farmer's Big Dogs review of the top 25 di...

8 sources: II Forge #75 on the utilities yield gap (XLU/VPU ~2 pts under the 10-year, widest since 2007, 2000/2007 precedents, AI power demand, AEP/NEE/DTE/LNT payouts), TIKR on how one Social Security rule saves a 66-year-old retiree $3,240 in tax on the same $56k income, TipRanks on two 9%+ yielders analysts like (FDUS, VTS), Seeking Alpha (Roberts Berzins) on two retirement income picks to hedg...

8 sources: II Forge #222 Fidelity options funds (FBUF buffer and FHEQ hedge cushioned spring 2025 and paid for it; 'uncapped' FHEQ kept less upside than capped FBUF; FYEE side card), Motley Fool on DGRO beating VOO over 20 years as S&P 500 top-10 concentration hits 40%, 24/7 Wall St on whether XOM's $4.12 dividend is safe after a 55% run, 24/7 Wall St on WMB/ET/PSX raises vs cash flow, Darth D...

8 sources: II Forge #175 Capture Test (QYLD kept 127% of the Nasdaq-100's gain over 1 year but 55% over 3; XYLD/JEPI took 195/136 days to recover in April 2025 vs SPY 79), ChartMill on Lockheed Martin's dividend quality, Dividend Informer on real yields at 2007 levels and a narrow market, Dividends Paradise on 2 oil dividend giants yielding up to 3.7%, Ryne Williams on 3 discounted dividend stocks...

8 sources: II Forge #11 (SATA's $100 flatline is engineered: a ceiling not a floor, three dumps tracked Bitcoin drawdowns, dip-buy 3 for 3 but lopsided, SATA +21.2% vs SCHD +35.8% vs SGOV +3.6%, Strategy's STRC daily-dividend vote today), TheStreet on PEP vs KO (KO +36% vs PEP -10% over the year), TipRanks on RBC's two high-yield picks up to 11%, 24/7 Wall St on Medtronic's small dividend raise, 2...

8 sources: II Forge #214 (FYEE vs JEPI vs SPYI: FYEE kept 89% of SPY's total return, SPYI 86%, JEPI 43%; FYEE's drawdown -17.3% vs SPY -18.8%; quarterly payouts), Dividend Blasters on DIVB's buyback tilt alongside SCHD, Investor Intellect on SCHD's Q4 raises (11 raises, zero cuts), Doug the Retirement Guy's first look at OVQ's 12% income target, Dividends And Income on DTE as a high-yield utility,...

8 sources: II Forge #62 (CHPY vs SMH: a ~40% yield trailed owning the chip stocks, +139% vs +170% since launch; payout shrank with NAV; return of capital; bull/bear), Viktoriya M Finance on high-income ETFs to dump, Dividend Growth Investing on 5 dividend stocks he'd never buy, Motley Fool on SCHD's record close without any Magnificent Seven stock, 24/7 Wall St on the $100B dividend ETF retirees a...

8 sources: II #183 (BALQ has the lowest payout rate of 5 Nasdaq income ETFs — GPIQ/ROCQ/TDAQ/QQQI — yet beat QQQ 3/19–10/22; 19a-1 shows 51% of 2026 payouts as return of capital), 24/7 Wall St on SCHD's 33% return vs 2% dividend growth, Investor Intellect on TCAL/GPIX/DIVO monthly payers, Doug the Retirement Guy on yield vs total return in S&P 500 funds, Morningstar on bond ETFs to own vs appr...

8 sources: II #196 crash test ($900K in VIG/DVY/O/EPD/MAIN/UTG/PFF/TLT from the Oct 2007 top paid ~$4,000/mo through 2008/2020/2022 while the balance fell 45%/41%/20%), 24/7 Wall St on a 67-year-old swapping JEPQ for SCHD in a $1.32M portfolio, TIKR on PEP vs PM for 20 years, ChartMill on Allegion's dividend quality, $100K Dividend on Enbridge's 5%+ yield, QQQY and GPIQ Nasdaq-100 income ETF video...

8 sources: II #142 OVL (beat the S&P since 2019 on a ~3% payout, now pays ~10%; put spread isn't a floor; fell harder in 2022), ETF Trends on FYEE and the derivative-income boom ($7B to $214B), Kiplinger on DIVB's dividend + buyback screen, Dividend Diplomats' 5 recession-proof dividend stocks, Darth Dividend on high-income ETFs without NAV erosion, Dividend Bull on the daily-dividend 15% yiel...

8 sources: II #213 Reader Question on SCHD top-30 FCF dividend coverage (60%→47% since 2022, two-thirds from the companies), Motley Fool $10k in 5 high-yielders (MO, AGNC, ET, PFE, O), TIKR Verizon vs PepsiCo, TIKR Kinder Morgan vs Realty Income, 24/7 Wall St 7-9% forever-income stocks, 24/7 Wall St $50k from the 5 highest-yielding S&P 500 stocks, Doug the Retirement Guy's 5 Nasdaq-100 income...

8 sources: II #208 Yield as Fuel backtest (EGGS/KQQQ/XQQI → MO/ENB vs direct vs SCHD), TIKR Chevron vs Realty Income, Trevor retired-on-dividends interview, Kelly Green dividend interview, Dividend Stockpile SPYD vs SPDG with State Street's Matt Bartolini, Dividend Diplomats five stocks and buy prices, Chartmill Dynatrace quality screen, Chartmill Evercore dividend-quality pick

8 sources: II #52 GPIX vs SPYI after-tax, TIKR Chevron vs BP, Morningstar durable dividends (20-stock list), Fool Kraft Heinz vs Monster, Darth Dividend high-yield ETFs to fund growers, growth vs value ETF portfolio, Dividendology $1M for $50K/yr, Doug the Retirement Guy three-bucket rebalancing

8 sources: II #205 RISR rate-hedge fund review, TIKR Realty Income vs MPLX, 24/7 Wall St $750K Roth IRA dividend portfolio, Dividend Talks 7 stocks not buying, Dividends4Me Big Tech bubble vs dividend value, Dividend Collection Agency O & MAIN, 7 Figure Dividends top 3 bond ETFs, Fool 5 pharma stocks for $1,000/mo

8 sources: II #194 $3,800/mo taxable book, TIKR Coca-Cola vs Chevron, 24/7 Wall St JEPQ vs QQQI, Doug the Retirement Guy on OVL, TIKR Edison vs Crown Castle, Fool SCHD vs VYM, Ryne Williams buying the dividend dip, Fool ET & WMB pipelines

8 sources: II #206 AT&T/SpaceX, TIKR UPS vs EPD, Fool J&J vs Pfizer, Dividends And Income on MCD, Dividend Stockpile on RISR, Doug the Retirement Guy on EGGY, Pay Me in Dividends on CHPY, Darth Dividend strategy

8 sources: Informed Investing Forge #16 (10-year Treasury vs dividend baskets), PTBW covered calls in a bear market, Investor Intellect step-up in basis, Russ Knopf on REITs, Doug SPYI vs GPIX/TSPY/ROCY, TIKR GIS vs CLX, Fool PayPal dividend, Fool 5 dividend stocks