Some pen notes on Trusts held in the SNOWBALL. Where available the forecast yield is published and a forecast price.

Whilst a positive forecast price is better than a negative price do not trade on the basis of the future price as this is unlikely to be achieved.

RISK

Altman Z-Score

The Altman Z-Score is a measure of the financial strength of a business. It identifies companies where the chance of getting into financial trouble or going bankrupt in the next two years is raised.

Using this model, a score below 1.8 suggests the company has a raised chance of getting into financial trouble, while companies with scores above 3.0 appear to be stable. The lower the score, the higher the chance of financial trouble. Compare with historical values and sector peers.

I’ve booked a ‘profit’ of £200 with TRIG to enable me to buy an opening position

in AGNC.

104 shares for 1k. The SNOWBALL is in a risk on mode so an opening position to monitor the share. Currently yielding 13%.

Company profile

AGNC Investment Corp is a real estate investment trust that invests in agency residential mortgage-backed securities. The firm’s asset portfolio is comprised of residential mortgage pass-through securities and collateralized mortgage obligations for which the principal and interest payments are guaranteed by a U.S. Government-sponsored enterprise, such as the Federal National Mortgage Association and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, or by a U.S. Government agency, such as the Government National Mortgage Association. It also invests in other types of mortgage and mortgage-related residential and commercial mortgage-backed securities or other investments in or related to, the housing, mortgage, or real estate markets.

Regional REIT Portfolio Value Falls 5.1% to £526.7 Million in First Half

Fiona Craig

LSE:RGL

08 September 2026

© Negative Space

Regional REIT (LSE:RGL) reported a 5.1% decline in portfolio value to £526.7 million for the first half of 2026, reflecting property revaluations and £21.5 million of asset disposals.

EPRA net tangible assets declined 3% to £305.8 million, while EPRA earnings per share fell to 4.2 pence. The company reported rent collection of 99.7% during the period.

Regional REIT reduced its dividend to 4.0 pence per share for the half year and continues to target a total dividend of 8 pence per share for 2026.

Asset Disposals Reduce Loan-to-Value Ratio

The REIT continued to dispose of non-core properties as part of its strategy to reduce borrowings and reposition its portfolio.

These transactions contributed to a reduction in net loan-to-value to 38.5%, alongside a decline in gross borrowings.

Regional REIT completed 26 new lettings during the period, generating £1.9 million of annual rent at an average of 2% above estimated rental value.

The company also completed a £1.1 million letting in Nottingham, which reduced vacancy-related costs at the property.

Regional REIT Invests £1.4 Million in Portfolio Upgrades

Regional REIT invested £1.4 million in capital expenditure during the first half, with spending focused partly on improving the energy performance of its properties.

At the end of the period, 87% of the portfolio was rated EPC C or better.

The company’s repositioning strategy involves retaining and upgrading core assets while preparing non-core and value-add properties for disposal. Regional REIT said it has additional assets either under offer or in negotiations.

Management said leasing decision cycles remain extended and investment market activity subdued. The company is continuing its disposal and capital expenditure programmes while managing its regional office portfolio.

Second-Quarter Dividend Set at 2.0 Pence Per Share

Regional REIT declared a second-quarter dividend of 2.0 pence per share, payable in October 2026. The distribution will be classified entirely as a property income distribution.

Shareholders will also have the option to participate in a dividend reinvestment plan.

Management said low levels of regional office development, construction costs and government support for devolution could support demand and rental growth. These remain management’s expectations rather than established future outcomes.

More about Regional REIT Limited

Regional REIT Limited is a London-listed real estate investment trust focused primarily on commercial office properties in regional U.K. markets outside London.

The company manages a diversified portfolio of regional properties and uses asset management, capital expenditure and disposals as part of its portfolio strategy.

Its investment programme includes property upgrades intended to improve occupier appeal and energy performance, while its disposal programme is used to reduce exposure to non-core assets and manage leverage.

This article was written by the editorial team at InvestorsHub/ADVFN and is provided for informational purposes only.

Thursday 10 September

CT UK Capital & Income Investment Trust PLC ex-dividend date
Gore Street Energy Storage Fund PLC ex-dividend date
Henderson High Income Trust PLC ex-dividend date
JPMorgan Global Emerging Markets Income Trust PLC ex-dividend date

Michael Foster, Investment Strategist
Updated: September 7, 2026

Look, we all know the old “truism” of investing: Want higher returns? You’d better be prepared to take on higher risk.

That’s not always true, however. In fact, sometimes markets do strange things, and a so-called “conservative” investment can turn around and deliver stunning returns. This is even more common in the world of closed-end funds (CEFs), where even stranger things can happen than in the “regular” stock world.

That’s in part because CEFs are a small market, so they tend to draw more individual investors, but fewer hedge funds and big banks. That can cause CEFs to overreact to some changes in the economy and markets and underreact to others, setting the stage for those strange moves I just mentioned.

Just such a thing has occurred at a CEF I’ve admired for many years, the 9%-yielding Virtus Equity & Convertible Income Fund (NIE). On the surface, this one sounds about as conservative as you can get.

For starters, its portfolio is stocked with established blue chips, with NVIDIA (NVDA), Apple (AAPL), Amazon.com (AMZN) and Caterpillar Inc. (CAT) among its top holdings.

But as you can see below, only around 56% of the fund’s portfolio is in stocks. Another 40% or so is in convertible securities, with the balance in cash.

Source: Virtus Investment Partners

Those convertible securities give the fund additional income while tempering volatility. NIE holds both convertible bonds and convertible preferred stocks.

Convertible bonds are debts issued by companies that can be “converted” to equity in the right circumstances (these vary from bond to bond). That gives these assets more potential upside, in addition to a consistent income stream.

Similarly, convertible preferred stocks pay higher dividends than “regular” stocks and feature less volatility. Like convertible bonds, they can also be converted to common stocks for additional upside.

With such a large portion of the portfolio dedicated to assets like convertibles, you’d expect a fairly stodgy return from NIE. But that hasn’t been the case. At my CEF Insider advisory, we sold this fund in May for a sweet 58% total return in a little over four years.

That’s a nice return for an income play like this, and we may very well swing back into this one in the future, especially when you consider that NIE has posted a 253% return in the last decade (we have, in fact, held it three times in CEF Insider over this period and banked a positive total return every time):

NIE Triples (and Then Some) in 10 Years

You can see at right, too, that the fund has largely moved sideways since our sell call in May, justifying our move and setting up the fund’s next jump, if history is any guide.

At the same time, NIE has been growing its payout, both in the form of special dividends paid earlier this decade and a growing regular dividend.

NIE’s Strong Returns Translate Into Higher Dividends

Source: Income Calendar

With this in mind, it’s clear that NIE is a good way to maximize income and diversify across hundreds of companies—and multiple asset classes, too. At the same time, it delivers far better returns than you’d expect from a portfolio like this. That stands in sharp contrast to the “more risk, more return” logic most folks believe.

Let me wrap with the fund’s discount to net asset value (NAV, or the value of its underlying portfolio). As I write this, it’s around 10%, which means we can buy for around 90 cents on the dollar. That sounds great, but it’s around the fund’s five-year average discount and narrower than the roughly 12% NIE saw when we sold it in May.

So we’re not buying until NIE’s discount widens further—ideally below that 12% level from last May. Until then, though, this is a top-quality CEF to put on your watch list.

As always

before you trade.

Can Law Debenture keep delivering for investors?

The UK income trust is performing well but has an unusual structure. We take a deep dive into its portfolio and positioning

Published on September 4, 2026

by Helen Kirrane ShareSave

UK equity income trust Law Debenture (LWDB) has had a strong 2026 so far, returning around 21 per cent – well ahead of the 12 per cent delivered by its benchmark, the FTSE All-Share.

Its longer-term performance looks even more impressive: over three and five years, it is the second-best-performing trust in the 17-strong UK equity income sector and takes the top spot over a decade with returns of 267 per cent.

A consistent approach has been key to this result. James Henderson has been involved in running the trust for over 30 years and was joined by Laura Foll as joint portfolio manager in 2019.

In July, the trust announced that Henderson will be retiring next June, leaving Foll at the helm. Such a high-profile departure would typically spark concerns about style drift, but analysts seem to think it is unwarranted this time because Foll and the veteran manager have worked side-by-side for many years.

We take a deeper look at Law Debenture’s approach and speak to Foll about how the managers are positioning the portfolio.

Approach and structure

The pair adopts a moderately contrarian approach to find well-managed companies at low valuations. They seek to avoid concentration, maintaining around 140 holdings. “This is not a shortlist, high-conviction portfolio. It’s about having a long list of companies that we think are, on balance, too cheap,” Foll tells the IC.

This means they do not take big bets on individual stocks, and instead aim to invest across a broad range of assets. The top 10 holdings make up just 25.9 per cent of the portfolio. “We’re deliberately not taking too much stock-specific risk. We want [the portfolio] to be diverse rather than having big chunky holdings in any particular name,” explains Foll.

On this front, Law Debenture differs from rival Temple Bar (TMPL), which is the best-performing UK equity income trust over five years and has benefited from taking bigger contrarian bets.

Law Debenture is unique in that 15 per cent of its net asset value (NAV) comprises an independent professional services (IPS) business it owns.

This provides third-party financial services, such as pension trusteeship, and the profits it generates are redistributed as dividends to Law Debenture shareholders. Martyn King, an analyst at Edison, describes it as “a very important part of the trust’s overall performance” as the business has funded roughly a third of the dividends the trust has paid in the past 10 years.

This makes for a dependable income stream. “I basically know that at the start of any calendar year, when I turn up on day one, a third of the income is pretty much in the bag,” says Foll. This, in turn, affords the managers flexibility to invest in stocks not paying dividends that are not traditionally found in other UK equity income portfolios.

That’s not to say the trust eschews the usual UK income payers altogether. A look under the bonnet reveals HSBC (HSBA), Shell (SHEL), GSK (GSK) and Rio Tinto (RIO) among the five largest holdings.

Story by Andrew Mackie

Woman riding her old fashioned bicycle along the Beach Esplanade at Aberdeen, Scotland.

When it comes to passive income, investors often focus on chasing the highest yields available. But the real mistake is not picking the wrong yield it’s misunderstanding what actually makes income sustainable over time.

What actually makes passive income sustainable?

Sustainable passive income typically comes down to five key factors:

• Earnings support
• Cash flow strength
• Payout discipline
• Sector structure
• Balance sheet resilience

At first glance, many income investors focus on the dividend yield. But each of these factors plays a more important role in determining whether that income can be maintained and potentially grown over time.

Earnings support is the foundation. Dividends are ultimately funded by profits, not share prices, and inconsistent earnings tend to lead to inconsistent income.

Cash flow strength matters just as much. Even profitable businesses can struggle to convert earnings into distributable cash, which creates hidden pressure on dividends.

Payout discipline determines flexibility. Companies that distribute too high a proportion of earnings have less room to absorb shocks when conditions deteriorate.

Sector structure also plays a role. Some industries naturally generate more stable revenue streams, while others are highly cyclical and more exposed to downturns.

Finally, balance sheet resilience provides protection when conditions weaken. High debt levels can force dividend cuts even when the underlying business remains profitable.

Taken together, these factors show that passive income is less about maximising yield, and more about identifying businesses capable of sustaining payments through different market conditions.

Importantly, the demand backdrop is also changing. Electricity networks are increasingly being shaped by structural trends such as AI-driven data centre growth, electrification of transport, and rising power demand across industrial systems. These are not cyclical drivers in the traditional sense, but longer-term shifts in energy usage.

That matters because regulated utilities typically earn returns based on the size of their invested asset base. As demand for grid capacity increases, investment tends to rise, which in turn expands that asset base over time.

In simple terms, growth in demand feeds through into more predictable earnings rather than volatility.

Of course, risks remain. Higher investment requirements can increase leverage, and rising interest rates can affect financing costs and regulated returns. There is also ongoing regulatory oversight that ultimately determines allowed earnings.

Bottom line

No income portfolio will ever tick every box all the time. Some stocks offer higher growth, others offer more stability, and very few deliver perfect consistency across all five criteria.

That’s why passive income investing is ultimately about balance rather than perfection â combining different types of businesses to create a portfolio that can hold up across different market conditions.

There are also other passive income ideas worth exploring that show how different approaches can work in practice.