Places you could have made money in 2011

With the stock market on track to end 2011 flat or slightly lower, you might think an investor just couldn't catch a break. That's not exactly true. There are a number of investments that have performed very nicely in 2011, even outperforming gold (-GC), which is up 10%.

Dividend stocks generally. You could buy the stocks in the Dow Jones Select Dividend Index ($DJDVP +0.12%), except that Dow Jones will only disclose the top 10 biggest stocks in the index. The index is up 7.7% this year. You could also buy the iShares Dow Jones Select Dividend Index (DVY 0.00%) ETF, which tracks the index. It's up 7.6% for the year. Utility stocks. The 15 stocks in the Dow Jones Utilities Average ($UTIL +0.19%) are up nearly 15% for the year. The big leader is NiSource (NI 0.00%), the natural-gas and electric utility company, up 35%. NiSource had two things going for it: a 4% dividend yield and the fact that utilities behave like bonds. If interest rates fall, utility stocks generally move higher.

Source: MSN Money

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