SCHRODER EUROPEAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST PLC
(“SEREIT” or the “Company” and, together with its subsidiaries, the “Group”)
KPN gives formal notice to terminate lease
Schroder European Real Estate Investment Trust plc, the Company investing in European growth cities and regions, provides a further lease update for its Apeldoorn investment.
Further to the update provided in its Annual Results statement on the 5 December 2025, the Company has now received formal notice from its tenant, Koninklijke KPN N.V. (“KPN”), of its decision to terminate its lease. KPN currently occupies a mixed-use office and data centre property in the Netherlands, representing approximately 19% of the Company’s portfolio income and 6% of portfolio value as at 30 September 2025. The lease termination will take effect from 31 December 2026.
The Investment Manager is pursuing a number of mitigation strategies, which include marketing the asset to new occupiers, exploring alternative uses such as medium-density residential development, or a potential sale to enable capital redeployment into accretive opportunities.
Apeldoorn is centrally located in the Netherlands, at the intersection of the North-South and East-West motorway axes, and is regarded as an attractive, steadily growing residential region, offering affordable housing and a higher quality of life compared to larger cities.
The Apeldoorn property was acquired in February 2018 for its income-generating characteristics, and has delivered an unlevered total return of over 8% per annum to date. As at 30 September 2025, the property was valued at €11.8 million, with valuations adjusted periodically to reflect the diminishing term of the lease.
As previously highlighted, KPN’s departure is expected to negatively impact the Company’s future income profile. In the event the Investment Manager is unable to fully offset the loss of income from the Apeldoorn asset, the level of future dividends or earnings cover will be impacted.
I get an itch when there is cash un-invested not earning a dividend, so until I decide on a longer term home for the un-invested cash I’ve bought for the Snowball 18907 shares in SEIT SDCL Energy Efficient.
The best annuity rate will vary depending on the value of your pension pot, the provider and your own personal information.
We asked retirement broker HUB Financial Solutions to crunch some numbers to get an idea of how much someone aged 65, 70 and 75 could generate from a £100,000 pension pot when purchasing an annuity. The quotes are based on someone living in the S66 postcode in England.
Its analysis shows that Legal and General is currently a market leader when it comes to annuity rates.
A 65-year-old could turn a £100,000 pension pot into an annual income of £7,732.80 by purchasing a single annuity. This changes to £8,459.88 if they have a medical condition, such as lifelong asthma in this scenario.
Older people can often access higher annuity rates. For example, that same £100,000 pot could generate an annual income of £9,957.60 from an annuity for a 75-year old, or £11,006.16 if there is a disclosed medical issue.
However, note that rates can vary and will change regularly.
A joint life escalation is £5,246.00
The 4% rule.
Above is the comparison share for the Snowball. Note the multi year sideways performance before it moves higher.
Current value £151,169.00 not too shabby.
Using the 4% rule it would provide a pension of £6,046.00
The Snowball will return income of over 10k this year, with a target of 10k for 2026.
So the options.
A joint life annuity of £5246.00. You have to surrender all your hard earned and the amount you will actually receive is a gamble on Gilt returns at the time. It could be lower or higher.
A 4% ‘pension’ currently £6,046.00. If the market crashes you may be forced to sell shares and the withdrawal amount will fall. It could of course be higher but you keep all of your capital
A dividend income stream currently 10k and should continue to increase and you also keep all of your capital.
You could include an ETF in your plan supported by your dividend paying shares. The choice my friend is yours.
2025’s Hottest CEF Is a Trap. Here’s What to Buy Instead for 9% Dividends
Michael Foster, Investment Strategist Updated: December 15, 2025
One thing I’ve always been astonished by is how fast a winning strategy (in investing and in life!) can suddenly slam into a wall—and start causing a lot of pain.
Consider, for example, the life of a mortgage banker in the 2000s: They made easy money for years, then the subprime-mortgage crisis threw them out of work overnight.
This happens in investing, too, which is why it’s always good to stay humble and well-diversified. Some high-yielding closed-end funds (CEFs), for example, look like big winners at any given moment. But if you buy without looking under the hood, you’re risking sharp losses.
Which brings me to …
The Top-Performing CEF of 2025
The year isn’t over, but the ASA Gold & Precious Metals Fund (ASA) is so far ahead of other CEFs that it would take a miracle for it to be overtaken by year-end.
ASA’s Unbelievable Year
ASA is up 172% (!) in 2025, and it’s easy to see why: The CEF invests in miners of gold and precious metals, and gold has been on a tear. But the scale of its run is still breathtaking, as none of the 5 CEF subsectors tracked by my CEF Insider service have even cracked 15%.
No way. For one, the fund yields just 0.1%, while the average CEF pays over 8.3%. So for us income investors, ASA is a no-go. Second, since gold miners’ share prices are tied directly to gold, ASA does well when gold soars, which happens every so often (such as in the past year), but these surges tend not to stick around.
We can see that last point in ASA’s long-term performance, in purple below, in relation to a popular S&P 500 ETF (in orange).
This Gold Fund Trails Stocks …
Over the last two decades, ASA has badly trailed the S&P 500 on a total-NAV-return basis (that is, by the performance of its portfolio, not its market-price-based return).
Worse, if you retired 20 years ago and bought ASA at that time with the intention of relying on it, many of your withdrawals would’ve cost you money, especially during the seven-year period in the 2010s when ASA (again in purple below) would’ve been mostly underwater for you.
Moreover, not only does ASA lag stocks in the long run, but it trails gold prices, too, shown in orange above by the performance of the gold-price-tracking SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) ETF, in orange, since that fund’s inception in late 2004.
… and Gold Prices, Too
The bottom line? If you’re looking for gold exposure, ASA is not the way to do it. In addition, the fund is a good illustration of why we avoid gold at CEF Insider: We’re looking for high current income first and foremost (our portfolio yields 9.5% on average), and there aren’t enough gold investments with yields high enough to excite us.
3 High-Yield Stock CEFs That Beat ASA
Looking beyond gold, there are many CEFs—on the stock and bond side, specifically—that beat ASA in terms of long-term outperformance and income. Below are three that all trade at attractive valuations, as well.
Both the Adams Diversified Equity Fund (ADX) and Liberty All-Star Equity Fund (USA) focus on stocks, including key blue chips like Nvidia (NVDA), Microsoft (MSFT) and Visa (V). And they give us those stocks at attractive discounts, with ADX sporting a 7.1% discount to NAV and USA trading about 10% below its portfolio value.
The 10.9%-yielding PIMCO Corporate & Income Opportunity Fund (PTY), meanwhile, is a corporate-bond fund that’s maintained a strong, and monthly paid, dividend since inception in 2002 (with regular special dividends).
PTY does trade at a 10.1% premium to NAV now, but that’s because it’s a PIMCO fund, and the firm has a sterling reputation in the small CEF world. And that 10.1% premium is actually a bargain, as it’s traded at a 19.7% average premium over the last 52 weeks.
These three funds get you a “mini-portfolio” yielding 10% on average, or roughly 90 times more than ASA. They’ve outperformed the gold CEF (in orange below) going back to 2003, the year that the youngest of these funds, USA, went through its IPO:
Top Bond and Stock CEFs Outrun ASA
Since then, ASA (in orange above) has delivered a return less than half the size of the other three, on average, while yielding basically nothing.
Of course, if we look only at 2025, we don’t see this: ASA looks like a big winner that is crushing the other three funds. That’s the risk investors face when they ignore history: a recency bias that can cost a lot of money.
Anyone making big profits today with ASA might feel like a big winner, and they are—for now. But over the long term, they have a strong chance of underperforming, especially if the fund reverts to the trend line it’s been on for decades. Worse, there’s no real income to tide shareholders over while they wait for ASA’s next rise.
Contrarians: These 8%+ “AI-Powered” Dividends Are My Top 2026 Buys
As we just discussed, gold, and gold-focused funds like ASA, are long overdue for a breather (or worse!). So we’re NOT chasing them as 2026 dawns.
But the sector we ARE buying as the new year breaks will likely surprise you: AI.
Not just AI stocks, but AI stocks (CEFs, to be specific) kicking out huge dividends! I’m talking about 4 specific funds throwing off 8%+ dividends as I write this.
Look, it’s impossible to ignore all the chatter about an AI bubble right now. I get it. But the bottom line is, corporate profits are still rising and American GDP is growing. This is NOT the opening act of a recession—it’s a boom in productivity!
And it’s still early days, too.
The trouble for us income investors is that “classic” AI stocks, like NVIDIA (NVDA), pay low (or no) dividends. Which is why we look to CEFs for our AI buys.
The S&P 500® is the major US stock market index. It tracks the 500 largest US companies. The S&P 500 index weights its constituents by free float market capitalisation.
ETF investors can benefit from price gains and dividends of the S&P 500 constituents. Currently, the S&P 500 index is tracked by 24 ETFs.
Source: justETF.com; As of 14/12/2025; Performance in GBP, based on the largest ETF.
Cost of S&P 500 ETFs
The total expense ratio (TER) of S&P 500 ETFs is between 0.03% p.a. and 0.15% p.a.. In comparison, most actively managed funds do cost much more fees per year. Calculate your individual cost savings by using our cost calculator.
The best S&P 500 ETF by 1-year fund return as of 30/11/2025
Barings Emerging EMEA Opportunities PLC ex-dividend date Diverse Income Trust PLC ex-dividend date Invesco Asia Dragon Trust PLC ex-dividend date JPMorgan European Discovery Trust PLC ex-dividend date Mercantile Investment Trust PLC ex-dividend date Northern Venture Trust PLC ex-dividend date Palace Capital PLC ex-dividend date Real Estate Investors PLC ex-dividend date SDCL Efficiency Income Trust PLC ex-dividend date STS Global Income & Growth Trust PLC ex-dividend date Templeton Emerging Markets IT PLC ex-dividend date Town Centre Securities PLC ex-dividend date Volta Finance Ltd ex-dividend date
I’ve bought as the replacement pair trade 1336 shares in BRAI Black Rock American Investment Trust.
BRAI are paying an enhanced dividend of 6% based on the latest NAV, so will be more variable than most dividends.
3 November 2025 The Board of BlackRock American Income Trust plc is pleased to announce the fourth quarterly interim dividend in respect of the financial year ended 31 October 2025 of 3.44 pence per ordinary share. The dividend is payable on 12 December 2025 to holders of ordinary shares on the register at the close of business on 14 November 2025 (ex-dividend date is 13 November 2025). The quarterly dividend has been calculated based on 1.5% of the Company’s NAV at close of business on 31 October 2025 (being the last business day of the calendar quarter) which was 229.56 pence per ordinary share.
If you type BRAI in the search box there is further research on the share there.
