I giggle with my evil grin when I look at my scottrade account statements and add the month’s dividends to my GNU-Cash account program. I like keeping my own books. Not because Scottrade is going to screw me (no evidence yet) but it keeps me connected to reality. I’ve you’re going to invest, you ought to pay attention.
A few years ago, in the depth of the crash, I figured that people would chase safe havens and seek yield. I did. I also got there before the Talking Heads pundits of 2010/11 claimed that seeking yields with large cap, dividend paying stocks is driving the market. Then Helicopter Ben did the QE, zero rates forever thing and the safety crowd fled to? Some of them bid up my fixed income securities. Thank You. And some of you ran towards the Lemming Cliffs of Safe Treasuries. Safety at any cost. Negative interest rates? That’s what I want!
Bond yields are moving up. That means your safe Treasury just dropped in price and you might have bought high and can’t sell higher. When your paltry 2% yield increases to 3%, youll lose a butt load of capital appreciation. Then again you’ll always have your 2% if you don’t sell.
Fixed income investments are not well understood by the general public (if they were, there wouldn’t have been the housing crisis).
