Just a few items of interest to note today for those that may have missed them. Many (most) of these items have been commented on in the various commenting categories.

Eagle Point Income (EIC) ‘right sized’ (cut) their dividend by cutting the common share payout. The cut was from 20 cents to 13 cents. Honestly the payout was too high anyway. While the common shares are taking a bit of a hit today there has not been any affect whatsoever to their senior securities (preferreds and baby bonds). I look at this as a positive for senior securities holders.

Another interesting item today is that the Gabelli Convertible and Income Fund (GCV) called for redemption a $10/share 5.20% perpetual preferred–this is not a publicly traded issue. My guess is that these few shares are from a prior ‘rights’ offering (just a guess as I didn’t look it up) Just interesting that they would call the issue–it is a small issue so maybe they are just getting rid of a paperwork headache.

And lastly Compass Diversified (CODI) has gotten themselves in trouble with some potential tinkerings with the financials of one of their companies—the common share dividend has been suspended and the preferred shares have taken quite a shellacking–all 3 preferreds look like the chart below. Maybe someone thinks this is a bargain?

It doesn’t take much to get a S&P500 party rolling—just a threat of giant tariffs and then a reversal within 72 hours will do the trick.

It’s amazing how quickly the market can move up and down–forget that the same budget deficit that has been hanging over our heads for years continues to hang over us. There MUST be folks (investors) that have a firm belief that somehow congress is going to deal with these deficits—not sure why anyone would believe that as they have proven time and again that it is near impossible. Just like at home you either cut spending or raise revenue (wages). While the announcements of all these investments in the U.S. are wonderful let’s see some of it materalize.

On the other hand maybe we will just bumble along for the next number years with higher interest rates–I can live with the higher interest rates–I have no plans to borrow money. Well we will just have to deal with it day in and day out.

Income issues are green this morning as interest rates move lower–down 7 basis points to trade around 4.44%—this has helped our accounts all remain in the green, but certainly not an amount to get excited about, but green is green.

I have made some trades today–as I wrote about on the weekend I was going to rearrange my CLO holdings—lighten up teh holdings of equity CLO holders and buy more in the debt CLO owners. I will recap what I have done either this afternoon or tomorrow.