47 High-Yield Picks With Yields More Than 10%

Posted by on

I ran the stock screener for high dividend/yield stocks, trusts and funds with yields greater than 10% and trading in the New York Stock Exchange. This resulted in the following list. Investors looking for high yields can use this list as a starting point for further research.

Stocks and Funds Yielding > 10%:

[TABLE=395]

Magyar Telekom Plc. of Hungary(MTA) and Telecom Corp of New Zealand(NZTCY) offer excellent dividends. Iowa Telecommunications Services (IWA) offers telecom services to customers in rural Iowa, Minnesota and Missouri.

BP Prudhoe Bay Royalty Trust (BPT) is a oil royalty trust operated by BP Alaska in the North Slope oil fields of Alaska. ING International High Dividend Equity Income Fund(IID) is closed-end fund which invests mainly in foreign stocks and derivatives linked to stocks.

Drug Stocks Offer Long-Term Investment Opportunities

Posted by on

In  a recent article I wrote that U.S. public healthcare spending is projected to exceed private spending by 2012. U.S. healthcare expenditures was estimated to reach about 17.3% of the GDP in 2009. One of the beneficiaries of all this spending are the companies in the healthcare industry such drug makers, health insurers, etc. They all may perform well in the coming years.

The table below lists the major drug stocks trading on the NYSE:

[TABLE=394]

AstraZeneca plc, GlaxoSmithKline plc, Novartis AG and Tongjitang Chinese Medicines Co. are the four foreign drug companies in the list. U.K-based AstraZeneca (AZN) is the owner of many top selling drugs including the “purple pill” Nexium which is used for the treatment of Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). Currently AZN offers a 7.75% dividend yield. GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) is another British giant whose products are sold in over 150 countries. GSK pays a 6.02% dividend. Switzerland-based Novartis(NVS) had sales of over $45B last year.Tongjitang Chinese Medicines Co (TCM) is a specialty drug company that is engaged in the manufacture of modernized traditional Chinese medicine.

Among the U.S. companies, Johnson and Johnson(JNJ) is by far the largest maker of a wide range of healthcare products. JNJ was founded in 1886. The stock is a high quality long-term consistent performer. Form JNJ’s investor site:

“Our consistent performance has enabled us to deliver an exceptional track record of growth that few, if any, companies can claim: 76 consecutive years of sales increases; 25 consecutive years of adjusted earnings increases; and 47 consecutive years of dividend increases. Over the last 10 years, Johnson & Johnson stock generated a 5.6 percent total return for investors compared to a -1.4 percent total return for the S&P 500.”

A Review of Retirement Age in OECD Countries

Posted by on

Tomorrow civil service workers in Greece plan to go on strike protesting the government’s pension reforms. A recent article in the NY times discussed the current situation in Greece.

From a BBC article titled Greece plans to ban early retirement:

“Greece’s government intends to raise the national pension age and ban early retirement as it tries to tackle its huge budget deficit.

The socialist government said it wanted to increase the average retirement age from 61 to 63 by 2015.

The steps would be part of a series of austerity measures aimed at curbing the country’s deficit and national debt.

But the moves have angered many of the unions, which have scheduled strikes in protest.”

According to OECD data, the average legal retirement age in OECD countries is 64. However in Greece it is as low as just 58. This is another reason why Greece is in turmoil now and the government is raising the retirement age. Millions of Greek workers retire early and receive fat pensions.In some countries like Norway and Iceland the retirement age can be as high as 67. Recently Spain inceased the retirement age from 65 to 67.

The  graph below shows the “labour force exit age – i.e., the actual average age when people stop working – is often higher or lower than the official retirement age” in  OECD countries:

Click to enlarge

OECD-Retirement-Age-Comparison

In Austria the average man exists the workforce at age 59 a full 6 years ahead of official retirement age.

Equity Tier 1 Ratios of Asian Banks

Posted by on

In the journal article “Sins of Past Guide Asian Banks“, Peter Stein notes that Asian banks are well capitalized than their U.K. and European peers. Singapore banks have higher equity Tier 1 ratios based on the proposed Basel 3 standards than Chinese and Indian banks. Australian banks are just a notch above European and British banks.

Chart

Asia-Banks-Tier1-Ratio

Related:

The Complete List of Foreign Bank ADRs Trading on the OTC Markets 

The Complete List of Foreign Bank Stocks  (includes Canadian Banks)

Are Coal Stocks a Good Buy Now?

Posted by on

Coal is the main source of electricity generation in many countries. In addition, coal is used in industrial and other sectors. The global consumption of coal is projected to increase each year by over 1.5% annually.

Yesterday Australia signed a $60B deal to supply coal to China for the next 20 years. As part of the contract each year Australia will ship 30 million tonnes of coal to energy-hungry China. It must be noted that China is the largest consumer of coal in the world and relies on coal to meet 70% of its energy needs.The deal is the largest single export deal ever signed by Australia. Thousands of jobs are expected to be created as a result of this contract.

 

world-coal-use-projection

In the U.S., coal-fired plants accounted for 44.4% of the country’s power generation thru October last year.

 

us-power-by-source

From the U.S. Energy Information Administration site:

“Coal use in the United States totaled 22.5 quadrillion Btu in 2006 92 percent of total coal use in North America and 48 percent of the OECD total. U.S. coal demand rises to 26.6 quadrillion Btu in 2030 in the IEO2009 reference case. The United States has substantial coal reserves and relies heavily on coal for electricity generation, a position that continues in the projections. Coal’s share of total U.S. electricity generation (including electricity produced at combined heat and power plants in the industrial and commercial sectors) declines from 49 percent in 2006 to 47 percent in 2030.”

14 Coal stocks that trade on the New York Stock Exchange are listed below:

[TABLE=371]

One of the stocks shown above is the ADR Yanzhou Coal Mining Co(YZC) of China. Yanzhou is engaged in the mining, processing, transportation of coal and generation of electricity. As for the answer to my title question, investors may want to consider coal stocks for the reasons mentioned above.