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I’m at all times looking out for passive revenue alternatives. And I’m fascinated by methods synthetic intelligence (AI) may also help make issues simpler, sooner, and extra environment friendly.
With that in thoughts, I requested three of the main chatbots for his or her concepts about the most effective passive revenue alternatives. The outcomes have been fascinating – however not that helpful…
What they stated
ChatGPT was the one one to offer me a solution in any respect. Gemini stated it isn’t allowed to advocate shares and Claude stated it doesn’t have entry to dwell market knowledge.
ChatGPT nevertheless, did give me a reputation. It truly gave me just a few, however the inventory on the prime of the listing was Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) – a well-liked identify with dividend traders.
It highlighted just a few key factors, together with the agency’s sturdy report of rising funds and its sturdy aggressive place in a fairly resilient market. However it missed one essential factor: the inventory comes with a 2.75% dividend yield. And whereas ChatGPT rightly famous that this isn’t notably excessive, it didn’t realise that I received’t even get 2.75% by shopping for the inventory.
Dividend taxes
Johnson & Johnson is a US enterprise and I’m a UK investor. Meaning any distributions I’d obtain from the corporate are topic to a 30% withholding tax. That is lowered to fifteen% with a W-8BEN type. So by the point the dividends hit my account, what I’ll get is extra like 2.35% – and this highlights one thing essential.
With out understanding every thing about my monetary state of affairs, it isn’t doable for ChatGPT to offer an correct evaluation of my returns. That’s not its fault, but it surely’s a key limitation.
My tax state of affairs means my revenue from Johnson & Johnson’s prone to be 15% decrease than ChatGPT may assume. Whereas I just like the inventory, I feel there are extra engaging alternatives.
FTSE 100 dividends
In my opinion, UK traders proud of a 2.35% dividend ought to take into consideration shopping for Howden Joinery Group (LSE:HWDN) as a substitute. It’s one other sturdy enterprise however with a better yield.
The corporate might be much less recession-resistant than J&J, however I feel it seems to be like a terrific enterprise. In contrast to its rivals, it focuses on commerce gross sales, which provides it some key benefits.
Certainly one of these is that promoting to commerce prospects is extra prone to generate repeat enterprise. And one other is that the agency doesn’t want costly showrooms – it will possibly function out of warehouses.
This implies it will possibly cost decrease costs than its rivals whereas sustaining wider margins. I see that as a extremely highly effective long-term place to be in, which is why I prefer it as an funding.
Insider data
There are good the reason why ChatGPT can’t inform me which dividend shares I can purchase. It will depend on particular issues about me that it’s unreasonable to count on AI to know.
It’s not nearly being a UK tax payer, numerous issues decide what’s greatest for me. So whereas I feel J&J’s an affordable concept, I don’t assume it’s my greatest passive revenue alternative.
On this sense, I truly assume the opposite chatbots have the best response. In a state of affairs the place AI isn’t able to make a fully-informed suggestion for me, the most effective factor to do is maintain off.

