Interval funds (iCEFs) are growing in popularity as an alternative investment vehicle. The SEC officially authorized iCEFs in 1992 as a best of both world’s alternative to closed-ended and open-ended funds. iCEFs had a slow start, the second iCEF wasn’t created until 2001 and the third fund formed in 2005. The structure is a small (0.1%) portion of the overall multitrillion dollar fund industry. However, iCEFs are growing assets quickly, in the 50% range annually with 42 current funds with a combined $28.52B in AUM as of August 31, 2018. This compares to CEF/BDC listed AUM of $280 billion in 564 funds according to CEFData.com. Read more…
John Cole Scott was interviewed by Chuck Jaffe on Money Life on October 1, 2018. Click here to listen to John discuss the following Tickers:
AEF, DNI, EXD, GHY, KTF; during “Hold It or Fold It:” BIF, GOF, JPC, CCD, FMO
Click HERE to stream the audio from this interview or
right click HERE to download the file and listen another time.
MoneyLife host Chuck Jaffe is senior columnist for MarketWatch. His weekly columns are syndicated nationally, and his “Your Funds” column is the most widely read feature on mutual fund investing in America. He is also the host of “Money Life with Chuck Jaffe,” a weekday radio show/podcast. In 2009, Chuck was named to MutualFundWire’s list of the 40 Most Influential People in Fund Distribution, the only journalist ever to make the list. Learn more on their website: http://www.moneylifeshow.com/
Click on the link and on the thumbnail to hear John Cole Scott’s analysis on SmartTrust’s CEFA Select BDC Trust strategy video.
Click on the link below
https://vimeo.com/275149591
Click on the link below to listen to CEFA’s John Cole Scott give his insights on The Streets September 
17, 2018 webcast titled “Why Closed-End Funds Could Deliver a Powerful Income Portfolio Boost”.
John Cole Scott held the latest “ABCs of BDCs and Closed-End Funds” webinar on Tuesday, August 28, 2018. Check out the replay or view the slides to hear John talk about: 
1. How to balance the risk/reward for CEFA’s Trifecta Analysis: discount capture, sustainable dividends and manager performance (NAV total return).
2. Current and historical trends for the universe of 600 funds.
3. How to build a hypothetical taxable and IRA account using the funds.
For a replay of the webinar please click here:
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/1597597384521554177
To see the slides from the webinar please click here:
http://www.cefadvisors.com/Download/ABCsofBDCsandCEFs-20180828.pdf
John Cole Scott was just quoted in a May 10, 2018 Kiplinger article by Tom Petruno titled 
“3 Ways to Earn 5% to 9% from Closed-End Funds”. Click on the link below to see what John had to say.
Click here to read article (subscription may be required):
https://www.kiplinger.com/article/investing/T041-C000-S002-3-ways-to-earn-5-to-9-from-closed-end-funds.html
Click on the link below to see John Cole Scott’s answers to the following questions presented in a recent Seeking Alpha Article. 
- Do you use closed-end funds for growth or for income?
- Based on your personal experience, what has been the biggest benefit that investing in CEFs has provided?
- Based on your experience, what has been the biggest drawback?
- If you had to explain to an acquaintance in just two or three sentences why you invest in CEFs, what would you say (i.e. what would be your “30-second commercial” for CEF investing?)?
Click here for the article (note: subscription may be required):
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4164562-great-cef-investing-author-interviews
Introduction:
Business Development Companies (BDCs) are a modification of the “1940 Act” created by Congress in 1980 to provide the opportunity for individual non-accredited investors to participate in private investments. BDCs are closed-end funds that provide small growing companies access to capital. They are domestically focused and are required to offer portfolio companies “managerial assistance”. On average, the portfolio company to BDC employee ratio is 2.4 which highlights the BDCs ability to be involved with their lendees in a direct and personalized way. As with mutual funds and ETFs, BDCs have tax-advantages and earnings are passed through to investors in the form of dividends. BDCs have gained interest since the Financial Crisis because traditional banks have generally reduced their focus on small business lending. There have been 14 BDC initial public offering (IPOs) in the past five years with a current market capitalization of $15.5B (47%) of the $32.8B total listed BDC universe. BDCs also provide much needed diversification in our opinion with a 10-year correlation to High Yield Bonds of 43.1% and to Senior Loan Funds of 37.9%. They also provide low correlation to MLP funds at: 44.9%, US Equity Funds at: 43.7% and REIT Funds at: 32.0% as of 12/31/17.
BDCs typically contain 25-150 different investments inside and are focused on loans vs. equity holdings. The loans are typically secured loans and pegged to Libor at a variable interest rate. There are 51 traded or listed BDCs. We benchmark the sector with CEF Advisors’ Debt-Focused BDC Index (http://cefdata.com/index/details/407/). As of February 5, 2018, the index is at a -11.5% discount to NAV and 10.47% indicated market yield, vs. a normal 8%-9% historical level. Leverage is 39.3%, bond exposure is 87.3%, 
75.1% of the loans are variable rate loans. Loans in non-payment or “non-accrual” status are 1.65% vs. a long-term average of 2%. You can see the recent price movements of market prices vs. net asset values in the charts below. Read more…
See John Cole Scott of Closed-End Fund Advisors quoted in a February 2018 Kiplinger’s Personal Finance article by Ryan Ermey, Staff Writer. John says “Ideally, you buy into a 
good, well-managed fund at a 15% discount, and if expenses are reasonable, you just bought a dollar with 85 cents”.
Click below to view the article. A subscription may be required.
https://www.kiplinger.com/article/investing/T041-C009-S002-earn-up-to-9-with-these-closed-end-funds.html
On January 18th we held our Quarterly Closed-End Fund and BDC Universe Update, Outlook, and IPO Review. 
Please watch the replay or download the slides to see what trends we covered in the CEF industry including:
*Discounts & Discount Trends
*Yield and Yield Trends
*Dividend Changes
*Last Quarter’s and Recent Peer-group performance (NAV and Market Price).
*UNII, Earnings and Return of Capital (RoC) Trends
* Recent CEF IPO’s
* Liquidity & Liquidity Trends
* Activist Updates & Trends
* CEF Deaths & Mergers
* NAV vs. Market Price Volatility
* New CEF Universe Data
* 2018 Outlook
* Pre-submitted & Live Q&A
