The Everyday American Portfolio Experiment

Dobromir Stoyanov submits:As an individual investor and blogger I do what I preach. I have a dividend portfolio which consists of almost 40 individual issues, most of them dividend achievers or aristocrats.

By Dividend Dog: Many basic materials stocks have dividend yields that exceed Treasury yields. Taking a long-term (10-year) view, many of these firms have steadily paid dividends, increased dividend payouts and generated respecitible returns on euqity. Seven such basic materials firms were found:

By Miriam Metzinger: Stocks discussed on the Lightning Round session of Jim Cramer's Mad Money TV Program, Thursday December 8. Bullish Calls: Johnson & Johnson (JNJ): "I think you are fine. I don't care for the management because of all the recalls. With a 3% yield and lots of drugs in the pipeline, it is fine for this environment."

Scott's Investments submits:This is my third article this week focusing on the US Dividend Champions, a list compiled and tracked at DRIP Investing. The list is comprised of stocks which have increased their dividend payout for at least 25 consecutive years.

By Richard Shaw (QVM Group): When we apply our quantitative fundamental screen for high quality, above average dividend yield companies, and cross reference that with one of our quantitative technical filters, two stocks among the more than 7,000 individual stocks on the NYSE and NASDAQ stand out.

- By Karin Hernandez: 4 Dependable Dividend Stocks that Cramer Likes Jim Cramer discusses a lot of companies on his nightly show on CNBC, Mad Money. Since my recent focus has been on good dividend-yielding companies, I decided to review some of his picks to see if they would fit into my dividend-growth portfolio.

By Miriam Metzinger: Stocks discussed on the Lightning Round session of Jim Cramer's Mad Money TV Program, Monday February 6. Bullish Calls: Apple (AAPL): "The best way to play Apple is Apple." Baidu (BIDU): "That's the only Chinese stock that I like."

My preference is for a lower use of bonds than the normal portfolio balancing strategies use. I just find the risks greater than the benefits. This preference increases as yields decline. Given the historically low interest rates we have been experiencing the last few years (and low yields even for close to a decade) I really believe bonds are not a good investment. Now for someone approaching or in retirement I do think some bonds are probably wise to balance the portfolio (or CDs). But I would limit maturities/duration to 2 or 3 years.