Last Friday, I told my premium subscribers to get ready for more volatility.

The market is getting pushed and pulled by opposing forces right now, with strong earnings optimism being countered by the uncertainty of the Omicron variant and a long overdue mea culpa from the Federal Reserve acknowledging that inflation is real, not a transitory illusion.

Keep in mind, light trading volume (which is common around the holidays) can exaggerate price swings, both to the upside and downside. That phenomenon was in full display on Black Friday, when many traders took a three-day weekend and the Dow tanked 900 points – its worst post-Thanksgiving showing since 1931.

Since then, we’ve seen relatively big swings in either direction, and I don’t see that letting up this week. On Friday, we learned that the consumer price index notched a 0.8% rise in November, bringing the overall year-over-year inflation rate to 6.8% — the highest rate since June 1982.

In the meantime, this week the Federal Reserve will hold its December meeting tomorrow and Wednesday. Investors will be looking for whether the Fed will end its bond purchasing program at an accelerated pace, as well as any indication on interest rate hikes next year (how many and how much).

Along with this, we’ll also get readings on the Producer Price Index, retail sales, and industrial production throughout the week.

Watching the markets in freefall on Black Friday, I took comfort knowing that some of our more vulnerable positions over at High-Yield Investing were protected by stop-loss orders. I steadily put these protective measures in throughout the year, and likened it to grabbing a parachute – you hope you won’t need it, but you’ll be glad you have it if you do.

Thankfully, so far, not a single one of those stop losses was tripped, as most of our portfolio holdings held their ground quite well during the selloff. In fact, quite a few remain at or near fresh 52-week highs.

Why I’m Confident In The Future

Still, this is not the time for complacency. The market, as a whole, remains overvalued by historical standards. And traders rarely need an excuse to take profits. So I intend to extend most of my stop-loss orders, and will likely add a couple more to nail down gains in this back-and-forth market.

You may want to consider doing the same.

That being said, I am cautiously optimistic that 2022 will bring further gains, in part because macro jitters will likely bolster the big-picture rotation from growth to value that has been taking shape. This welcome tailwind for our portfolio will hopefully continue to gust and favor dividend payers going forward.

Speaking of which, here’s an updated look at the income produced by our portfolio last month.

Having just added a 7.8% yielder and a 6.7% yielder in the last two issues of High-Yield Investing, I expect this total to continue rising – even before considering recent dividend hikes.

If you simply followed our hypothetical portfolio dollar-for-dollar, you’d collect a healthy $735.65 last month. Considering the average retired worker collects a $1,553.68 check each month from Social Security, according to the Social Security Administration, that’s not bad.

Of course, our hypothetical portfolio is just that… hypothetical. You can scale up or down, depending on your preferences. In fact, many of our premium readers collect much more than this…

Regardless of where you’re at, this should be proof-positive that you don’t necessarily need to reach for risky “growth” stocks. A stable of quality dividend payers can make you rich over time.

The takeaway from this is simple. By having a portfolio full of solid income-producing securities, my premium subscribers and I can sleep easy at night. We’re less concerned about the daily gyrations in the market than most investors. And what’s more, the income we earn can go toward our monthly expenses – or be plowed right back into our positions for even more income in the future.

In the end, the choice is up to you. But that’s what having a portfolio like this gives you… choices.

If you’re looking to get started with a handful of high-quality income-payers, that’s where my latest report comes in…

I’ve handpicked 5 of my absolute favorite dividend payers for a very special purpose. Each one of these is what I consider to be “bulletproof” – meaning you can build your portfolio around them, sleep well at night, and watch the income roll in year after year.

Go here to learn about them right now.