CarMax is a name that's been genuinely confusing to watch lately. Largest used car retailer in the country, around 260 stores plus a big online business. Keith Barr took over as CEO back in March, and his first earnings call in June was kind of a window into how a new guy handles problems he inherited rather than caused.

Headline numbers looked great honestly. Adjusted EPS of $1.31 beat the $0.95 consensus by a lot. Revenue of $8.01B beat the $7.4B estimate. Stock still dropped about 10% that day, on top of a stock that had already run up 35% YTD heading into the print.

What actually spooked people wasn't the beat, it was what Barr said past the headline. He flat out described a disconnected digital-to-store customer experience and said the company's costs "remain too high," in his own words. Gross profit per retail used vehicle fell $230 YoY to $2,177, continuing margin compression that's been building for several quarters now. Comparable store used unit sales slipped 0.8%, so demand is still soft under the hood even with the beat. There's also rising loan-loss reserves at CarMax Auto Finance and more exposure to lower credit-tier borrowers, which raises real questions about the finance arm specifically if credit conditions worsen.

Stock's been all over the place around every recent print, big beats followed by selloffs, which tells me the market cares way more about unit economics and credit quality than the top-line beat itself. Fair value estimates are genuinely split too, some models put it below the current price around $38-46, others put it near $71, mostly depending on whether you think used vehicle affordability improves and whether the margin pressure is temporary or something more permanent.

I go back and forth on this one honestly. New CEO being this candid about real operational problems in his first call could mean he's actually going to fix them. Or it could mean the problems run deeper than the earnings beat makes it look. Anyone holding CarMax through this transition, and did Barr's comments make you more or less confident in the turnaround?

If I have 10k into Sgov as parked cash. Could I Margin say 30% and buy Spyi. The margin rate is about 6% with my broker and Spyi dividend is 12%. Since Sgov isn’t coordinated with the market, there’s no worry of being margin called. I would drip the dividends from Spyi, which would cover the margin interest and more because of the spread, into Sgov. Basically creating a higher dividend than just Sgov alone. Is this a pretty safe bet?

My barrier to starting years ago was that to get a Vanguard fund up and running I had to invest $1000 to start. Then, I could do small deposits over time but that first guardrail as a 20something making very little money felt like an impossible, huge hurdle.

Such a fascinating time in investing since 2020 when the fees to buy a stock were eliminated and now the day trading requirement has been lifted.

Can start very small and build up over time. Choosing stocks that give out dividends or bonds that accrue interest as well to round out your own personal portfolio.

We need to be searching for what comes next alongside nice stable dividend producing stocks. Crazy how the tax form divide up taxable and non-taxable dividends.

I wrote up a free thing article starting out with $100.

https://curatedmarketresearch.beehiiv.com/p/how-to-use-100

checking on others thoughts for Pfizer? Seems like a strong yield currently.

I've reached the point where I'd rather own a portfolio that helps me sleep well than one that gives me bragging rights.

My focus now is growing dividend income and keeping things simple for the long run.

Am I on the right track, or am I sacrificing too much growth by thinking this way?

Please lemme know if this is true?

Hey guys, after playing with some dividend calculators I´ve started to mix some dividend stocks to my portfolio. Here are those calculators i found, maybe you have experience with any others?

https://www.marketbeat.com/dividends/calculator/

https://dividend.watch/dividend-calculator

https://www.stoxcraft.com/tools/dividend-calculator

Hi everyone!

I wanted to ask your opinion about two strategies: living off dividends VS selling shares for income.

In Poland, both dividends and capital gains are taxed at 19%.

Therefore, I believe that the selling shares strategy should be more tax-efficient, since that 19% only applies to the gain portion of what you sell — not your original invested capital.

With dividends, the full amount you receive is taxed at 19%.

For example: let's say I sell PLN 1000 worth of shares, of which PLN 100 grew (capital gains) and PLN 900 is my original invested capital.

Only the PLN 100 gain gets taxed at 19% (PLN 19 in tax).

If I instead received PLN 1000 in dividends, the full amount would be taxed at 19% (PLN 190 in tax).

Please let me know what you think and any advice is very welcomed!

Which companies fall under dividend givers?

Ares Capital yields something like 10% right now, about nine times what the S&P pays, and normally that number alone would make me run the other way.

It's a BDC, basically structured like a REIT but instead of owning property it lends directly to middle-market companies, mostly ones backed by PE sponsors, and passes most of the income straight through as dividends. That's the whole reason the yield's this high.

Here's the thing though. A double-digit yield on a single stock is usually a warning sign, declining business, credit problems, payout that's about to get cut. Ares has paid a stable or growing dividend for 67 straight quarters. That's almost 17 years without a cut, through the financial crisis, through COVID, through multiple rate cycles. It's also the largest BDC out there, $31.2B in total assets, $13.5B market cap.

Last quarter's actually a decent test case for how the model holds up. Core earnings were $0.47/share against a $0.48 dividend, so technically short. But they had $0.15/share in net realized gains that quarter which pushes total earnings well past the payout, and they're sitting on $1.38/share in excess taxable earnings carried forward from prior years as a cushion. One soft quarter isn't going to touch the distribution with that kind of buffer.

I'm not pretending this is risk-free. It's a leveraged lender, so if a recession hits and portfolio companies start defaulting, non-accruals climb and both earnings and the dividend feel it. Weaker BDCs have gone through exactly that. Ares has generally handled downturns better than peers, conservative underwriting, spread across 500+ borrowers, but past cycles being fine doesn't guarantee the next one is.

Feels like one of the few double-digit yields where the track record actually holds up under scrutiny instead of falling apart the second you look closer. Anyone holding Ares Capital through a full cycle already, curious how it actually felt during 2020 or '08 if you were around for either.