This article highlights some other investments with an unconventional investment methodology that exceeds the market returns of the major U.S. indices. Since it's inception, the U.S. option exceeded the 20% returns of the Nasdaq and S&P500 with an impressive 25% return and international arm exceeded 30%. Since they're ETFs, there is no load or minimum investment and the management fees are low at 0.38%. Since the instruments are only a year old or so, there isn't a long proven track record, but according to some research, they backtested well, which is what kicked it off in the first place.

Update 2009: I've listed 15 High Yield Corporate Bonds and Muni Bonds: Deal of a Lifetime Updates at Darwin's Finance.

For the U.S. based ETF, (DTN) tracks the WisdomTree Dividend Top 100 Index, which tracks the performance of the 100 highest dividend-yielding companies in the WisdomTree LargeCap Dividend Index. The Index is composed of the top 100 companies ranked by highest dividend yield from the WisdomTree LargeCap Dividend Index. The Index is dividend-yield weighted. A component's weight in the Index is determined annually by dividing its indicated annual dividend yield by the sum of all the indicated annual dividend yields for all the component companies in the Index. Holdings are listed below. I've also listed the Dividend Tree website; they have several other ETFs with likeminded investment philosophies, but I wanted to highlight this one as the most widely publicized and mainstream of the group. It outperforms its peers from WisdomTree for the U.S. Funds. However, there is an international one that outperforms the U.S. with a similar methodology; cited below.



Here is the DTN chart compared to the U.S. market indices:










Below is a list of the DTN ETF's top 25 holdings, courtesy of Morningstar:

For similar opportunities, see the earlier part in this series at the links below or by visiting the archives, which also include international real estate investment trusts and hedging strategies:

http://everydayfinance.blogspot.com/2007/04/real-big-returns-from-real-estate-funds.html

http://everydayfinance.blogspot.com/2007/03/mutual-fund-that-can-hedgeand-beat.html

http://everydayfinance.blogspot.com/2007/04/market-beating-investments-part-3.html

http://everydayfinance.blogspot.com/2007/03/high-yield-investments-real-thing-part.html

http://everydayfinance.blogspot.com/2007/02/high-yield-investments-for-real.html

International Dividend ETFs:

For some diversification and greater potential for high returns (and risk), there are the international options, (DTH) and (DOL), which essentially target the same methods, but instead rely on international equities. These outperformed even the DTN by several percentage points over the past year. I've plotted all the top WisdomTree funds below. I'd recommend one of these international ETFs and the U.S. ETF for any international and domestic portfolio components.

Chart (of course, note U.S. indices on the bottom):

Links and research:


Morningstar Report top 25 DTN Holdings:

http://quicktake.morningstar.com/etfnet/Holdings.aspx?Country=&Symbol=DTN&fdtab=portfolio



Wisdom Tree Home Page:

http://www.wisdomtree.com/home.asp



Yahoo Finance Chart Overlay:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=1y&s=DTN&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=dln%2Cdtd%2Cdon%2Cdes%2Cdhs%2Cdol%2C+dth&c=%5EGSPC