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Yield Shark

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16 Comments
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donwen1331
Member
donwen1331
November 18, 2012 7:57 am

This news leter is not what it claims to be, and its claimed results bear no relation to reality.The reccomendations are well thought out, but the analyst is very weak on technical analysis . The definition of “reasonable” includes pink sheet stocks and most brokerage houses do not allow stop losses on pink sheet stocks so you are flying without a parchute. Ideas are good fundamentally and bad technically. The site gives access to Mauldin’s ideas. These tend to be those of a fiscal conservative but not a nutty one as those on Fox, but Mauldin has a free news letter . Customer service will answer the phone and allow you to terminate a news letter that has cost you money with a pro rated refund if you are unhappy. Not a good response. Mauldin should spend less time telling us of his travels and more editing this newsletter. All in all the letter is NOT worth the money.

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tampat
Member
tampat
January 21, 2013 10:30 am

SInce launching the service in July, 2012 they have made good picks. Only one of their rec’s turned out to be a loss and that was the pink sheet stock referred to by another reviewer. If you follow their recommendation to use a 20% stop loss thats what you would have lost on that one. Every other pick has been a winner when closed out and the one’s still being held are all profitable picks.

All the stocks they rec are dividend stocks. The previous review stating they just pick pink sheet stocks is just plain wrong and you could place a stop loss order on all their rec’s so maybe that reviewer needs a new broker. Even if you didn’t have your stop in the market, it was easy enough to get out when it fell 20%.

I subscribed during their special offer of $99 per year and I would say that it was easily worth it.

I only dealt with customer service once and sent them an email. They responded within 24 hours.

My only complaint is the gap open the day after a rec as some of the picks have been lower volume stocks, but not pink sheeters. Their last rec gapped open the next day above the recommended buy price and didnt come back down, still going up so I missed that one.

Overall I’d give them a B, but no one who subscribes can complain that they have lost money if they followed the newsletters instructions.

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misty6
Member
misty6
January 29, 2013 5:41 pm

I think one pick tells the whole story. Poseidon POOSF. Touted at about $15 saying all that could go wrong was “competition and regulation” and that it had “PROFITS ON FIRE”. In less than a month POOSF lost 70% of its value. In 2 months it was down 95%. It closed at 1,24 on 1/28. In other words Mauldin picked the worst performing stock in the entire stock universe. How does the man do it?

(He excuses himself by saying there was a stop loss but as many of his subscribers found, you can’t put a stop order on a “pink sheet” stock with many brokers.) Of course this is to obscure the terrible he made in the 1st place.

Don’t trust his numbers. He has put 2 different stop losses on the same stock in the same newsletter. Last month he put a stop price of $35 on LINE, Linn Energy, LINE hit 35 on Dec 31 and then rallied. Mauldin said the stop didn’t count b/c there was a dividend that SHOULD have counted. Oops my bad, I was stopped out.

The only good thing is that part of the name is correct: SHARK.
Never forget that your loss is NOT limited to your subscription price, you can lose a fortune on these picks.

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investletters
Member
investletters
January 31, 2013 12:57 pm

We have recently written a number of blog posts (at InvestLetters.com) about Yield Shark inconsistencies and difficulties in interpreting stop loss order instructions.

Since we personally subscribe to Yield Shark and try to mimic their portfolio with our own money we certainly echo some of the other user reviews regarding POOSF (our broker did not accept limit orders on “F” stocks either).
And recently they even added a bonus reco to their portfolio even though it never dropped into the “buy price” range given.

Frustrating and I hope that they are monitoring their online reputation and paying attention to all the obvious subscriber contacts/questions they are receiving with an open mind to improving the service.

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Stefan
Stefan
February 26, 2013 4:13 pm

As a longtime reader of John Mauldin’s website and his regular world view articles, which are 5 stars excellent, I was excited to subscribe to the new Yield Shark newsletter, which was to name actual stocks for investment. It proved difficult to invest in many recommendations, which were often “buy at X dollars or less” when the stock was already higher, and in many cases continued higher. Outside of a stop loss figure, there was little follow up advice on these stocks. Mostly you received one newsletter per month and were left to fend for yourself in the interim. In one recent instance, a Mauldin advertisement for Yield Shark was hyping a stock (ARII) that would be revealed if you subscribed. Travis, a true marvel, unmasked that stock a few days before the Yield Shark newsletter arrived at its paid subscribers and the stock had already risen too far on Gumshoe’s announcement to be worth investing. That was the last straw and I unsubscribed to Yield Shark. Very disappointed.

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budwood
Member
February 28, 2013 1:41 am

I, too, am subscribing to Yield Shark. Picks are not bad, but the timing is a little behind the times. Good picks in several cases and good overall evaluations. However, I haven’t made money and will probably not renew. There are better newsletters for my time and money.

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agau
Member
agau
October 27, 2013 12:56 pm

A charter subscriber in 2012, I chose not to renew after the first year. The initial sales pitch was that a subscription to the newsletter was ‘buying John Mauldin’. Not so!

Example: In John’s free letters, he made it perfectly clear that his no-lose investment for the second half of 2012 was to short the yen, (and long-time readers of Mauldin know that he seldom calls anything a sure thing.) Although this timing coincided with the launch of Yield Shark, what was the recommended Yield Shark suggestion for shorting the yen? There was none!

Instead, nine months later, there was a Yield Shark recommendation to BUY Asian debt securities via the FAX ETF. Are you kidding me?

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D Brown
D Brown
December 16, 2013 3:32 pm

Best I can do here is share my own experience, on the basis of which I am continuing with the service, which recently announced a new “buy and hold” portion of their portfolio, in response to supposed subscriber criticism about overly frequent trades. I’ve bought 6 of YS’s recommended holdings in 2013 and have unrealized gains on 4 of them. The one realized loss was 12% when a trailing stop triggered, and the stock has continued to decline so I’m glad about that stop. Overall I’ve gained 6.7% since my first purchase in May 2013 (incl dividends reinvested), and it’s paid many times over for the subscription cost. I’m OK with that and consider this service not such a bad choice for somewhat conservative dividend investors who already have utilities and telecoms. One aspect that troubles me, though (and explains why I bought none of their recommendation for my first 6 months as a subscriber) is that their recommendations often show a “hold” for current subscribers, but a “buy” for new subscribers. I do not completely understand this seeming double standard….if someone shouldn’t add to their existing position, why would someone else wish to establish one at a higher cost? If the reason is solely to give new subscribers something to do, that doesn’t work for me. I do not mean to “damn with faint praise, ” but so many other newsletters tick me off with selective, over-inflated hype about performance, that I consider YS’s comparatively sober, reasonable tone and approach to be preferable.

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gm171
gm171
January 14, 2014 2:03 pm

Was a charter member, but found the service to be of little value to me. I do respect John Mauldin’s world view. I just found this newsletter lacking in investment strategy meaningful to me.

Joe Scott
Guest
Joe Scott
July 29, 2015 9:42 pm

I too was a charter member. I’ve read John’s newsletters for years and was really excited to have his team guide my investments. Unfortunately, my trust was misplaced.

I’ve followed their recommendations as exactly as I have been able to. My total (~3 year) return is ~0.1%.

I find their support unhelpful. They know nothing about the newsletter and seem unable to collect relevant answers from the analysts. Several times (most recently with TM) a stop loss was triggered but the stock wasn’t officially sold from the portfolio. I asked support what to do and they responded with a completely noncommittal, unhelpful answer.

Additionally the letter itself several times has IMO been dishonest about its returns. They state returns that are impossible unless purchases or sales were made before recommendations were sent out.

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groovygeek
Member
groovygeek
August 22, 2015 3:57 am

Another charter member here and another decision to drop the subscription. Mr. Mauldin has, in one form or another, cost me dearly. I have enjoyed reading his free newsletters for nearly a decade, so when he offered a subscription service I decided to give it a try. As others have reported, after several years of strong general market returns I am somewhere between break-even and midly down. I would be willing to ascribe that to his somewhat contrarian views… but a few of his selections raised eybrows along the way. GRMN when GOOG maps makes it completely pointless to own the majority of their products? TAXI when Uber is wiping the floor with cabbies all over the country? The straw that broke the camel’s back was a recent recommendation of lithium investment play that showed complete lack of understanding of the fundamental economics of lithium – a relatively cheap and very easy to recycle metal. Fortunately for me I had devoted a small-ish portion of my portfolio to Yield Shark. The real killer came from his referral to an investment adviser. I am not a “qualified investor” so he referred me to CMG capital. I was just changing jobs and decided to roll over my sizable 401k’s to IRAs as well as a taxable account managed by CMG. After 3 years in strong markets all they had to show for themselves as (a) 2%+ management fees that they were collecting (b) an endless stream of trades that made filing taxes at the end of the year a PITA a (c) at minimum 10% under performance PER YEAR consistently over the three years. Pulled the plug on CMG in 2014, pulling the plug on Yield Shark as I write this, and will likely be unsubscribing from his free letters too.

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mattfair
Member
mattfair
September 1, 2015 4:25 pm

I too was a charter member of Yield Shark. Had some winners as well as a slew of losers. Found the TM situation most disturbing as I was taken out, sent a question to yield shark help and heard NOTHING. Cancelled before the report came out last week. Tony Sagami is a HORRIBLE STOCK PICKER. It was actually not too bad a service I didn’t think when someone else or Mauldin was running the show? Or maybe I was fooled and Sagami ran it from the beginning. but I likely lost money on my membership even though as I say I likely “broke even” from a standpoint of selling winners and selling losers. Some real weird decisions. A year ago RGR was tearing up the charts and a decision by Sagami was “let’s lock in gains here” as he didn’t expect it to go up so fast. After we sold, I think it raced up another $10 – $12!!! 🙁
Anyone still a subscriber?? Would LOVE to know if Sagami is STILL PUSHING WYNN?? Man, I got burned on that FALLING KNIFE TWICE. Bought, sold for a loss.. Bought on the “dip” sold for another 20%+ loss. After that I was done. Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice shame on you….or however the saying goes. Saw WYNN was at $71 today and 6 weeks ago he was still pushing a screaming BUY at $100! He believes in Macau and all the Chinese high rollers from his time over there. Dude, you must have stayed in a hotel the years you lived there watching US TV or something, because if your feet were still on the ground you would notice there is a huge meltdown in China and no one is gambling in the high roller, medium roller or low roller casinos….Don’t mean to pile on, but seems his dividend seeking investments are better in a bear market. Hindsight being 20/20 and all that.

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mattfair
Member
mattfair
September 1, 2015 4:31 pm

Yield Shark didn’t work for me

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fango08
fango08
November 29, 2017 11:20 pm

This letter has been significantly improved over the last year. Patrick Watson took over editorial duties, he has sent out updates beyond the monthly cycle as he sees necessary, and has thrown in better advise regarding the mechanics of trading such as reminding folks that “do not reduce” might trigger a sell order that was in-intended. I think his macro-level, dividend focused approach is better now, and the price is down-right cheap for the subscription.

BrianP
Guest
BrianP
April 4, 2019 3:00 pm

Yield Shark has a new editor (again). This time it’s someone named Robert Ross. Not familiar with him but his stock picks have been good since he’s started. I’ve made some money.

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damarkley
Member
damarkley
April 10, 2019 3:56 pm

What is the “Social Security Catastrophe Plan” they’re hyping?

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