Let's look at preferred once more!

Markets are looking for direction and its good thing. After multiple weeks of ascent, markets finally took a pause and little slide as happened last week is good for health of rally. With Q3 results starting in 2 weeks, markets would trade in range between 9300 to 9800. So this is good time to identify some picks with great risk/reward ratios. With that in mind, let's look at preferred securities once more. Check out my previous blog on this topic which I wrote when DOW was at 7000.

Here are some preferred which could offer great upside and quarterly returns in terms of dividend.

• SFI-D ($7.70), SFI-E ($7.5) and SFI-G ($7). All these are preferred of istar financial (SFI). Most probably istar would survive this downturn in which case these preferred should trade near their face value ($25). Even in these times, board has not cancelled dividends on these preferred. The yield on these preferred are about 25%
• IDG ($17), IGK ($18). These are preferred of dutch financial giant ING Group. Much safer than SFI preferred but offers yield of about 11-12% and upside of about 25%
• RNP ($9 to 9.50) - this is mutual fund which invests in preferred securities. It is selling at 16% discount to its NAV and offers yield of over 8%
• For those of us with most tolerance to risk, CIT-A ($3.90). This is purely speculative play on survival of CIT. If CIT restructures its debt out of bankruptcy court, this preferred could easily double or triple (similar to preferred of many banks). CIT needs to present its restructuring plans by Oct 1. Based on recent movements of prices of its bonds and equities, market is betting that it may be able to skip BK. Let's see what happens. Caution: This is extreme risk/reward and you could lose all your investment in CIT-A. So invest with extreme caution!

Indian festival season has started with Navaratri, Vijayadashmi and Diwali. We were also polishing our Garba and Dandiya skills to get ready.

Have a great weekend !

/Shyam