The diversification worm has turned

THE CONTRARIAN INVESTOR

It has been a miserable month for all those dedicated to pursuing the dividend cheque as the primary source of long-term shareholder returns.

One reader of my FT column was virtually in tears as he recounted his terrible experiences with an iShares FTSE 350 dividend tracker called the UK Dividend Plus ETF. Back in 2006, the shares of this mechanically screened fund stood at around the £11 mark – now they hover at £7. It is not just investors who have been having a rough time. My friend Rob Davies runs a dividend-weighted index-tracking unit trust called the Munro fund – it weights its fund composition by calculating the total amount of dividends paid using one year forward estimates. Rob is an honest fellow and even he admi...