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What’s the proper role of dividends in your portfolio? With fixed-income investments paying so little and a 15% tax rate on dividends for most middle-income taxpayers many investors are looking to dividends for yield. And companies like Verizon and AT&T now yielding in excess of 4% compared to just 1.88% for the 10-year U.S. Treasury sweeten the pot.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped above 15000 for the first time in its history Friday morning May 3 2013. It’s up more than 120% from its 2009 lows. And the S&P 500 Index closed at an all-time high of 1600.

The new 3.8% surtax on unearned income that took effect on January 1 2013 applies to individuals with Modified Adjusted Gross income (MAGI) in excess of $200000 and couples with MAGI in excess of $250000. Of course the tax tail should never wag the dog but here are some strategies that might help you minimize the tax bite:

At the end of 2012 assets in hedge funds had grown to a record $2.25 trillion from $488 billion in 2000 according to Hedge Fund Research. Today because individual investors have joined institutional investors hedge funds seem almost mainstream. So should you invest?  By design that’s hard to say.

The New York Times headline noted above said it all. Zweig published the successful investment newsletter “The Zweig Forecast” and served as chairman of Zweig-DiMenna Associates LLC a New York investment firm. He also published two books Winning on Wall Street and Winning with New IRAs.

The last of the kids graduates this May – and you’re looking forward to having a little extra cash. What should you do with it? The same thing you should have done when you paid off your car loan – direct those extra dollars to your retirement savings accounts.

As copywriters well know when you reference learning in a headline readers’ interest tends to perk up. Add a mention to the “rich and famous” and you really generate interest. So “Lessons of the Rich and Famous . . .

There are a variety of characteristics a successful client-advisor relationship should have. Chief among them is that the relationship must be consultative. In my practice that involves much more than simply working together with clients in an open and honest partnership to meet their goals.

It’s a new year and we’ve likely all made resolutions to improve ourselves.

“When we meet real tragedy in life we can react in two ways — either by losing hope and falling into self-destructive habits or by using the challenge to find our inner strength.” That inspiring thought comes from the Dalai Lama and it is certainly applicable in the wake of the unfathomable tragedy in Newtown Connecticut.