Turning 73 changes the math on your retirement account. The IRS no longer lets your traditional IRA compound in peace. It demands a required minimum distribution every calendar year, calculated off your December 31 balance, whether the S&P 500 just hit a record high or just gave up 20%. Sell into strength and you lose future compounding. Sell into weakness and you lock in losses that never come back. The workaround is to structure the account to throw off enough cash on its own so the RMD comes out of distributions rather than principal. Three funds do that job cleanly: JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF (NYSEARCA:JEPI), iShares Preferred and Income Securities ETF (NASDAQ:PFF), and iShares Treasury Floating Rate Bond ETF (NYSEARCA:TFLO).
The Problem the IRS Created for You
Your RMD is not optional and it is not sensitive to market timing. Miss it, and the penalty is punishing. Take it from share sales in a down market, and you crystallize the drawdown right when your portfolio can least afford it. The fix is boring but effective: hold assets that pay you monthly, sweep the cash into a settlement account, and let those distributions cover the withdrawal. (The tax bill that lands the first year required withdrawals kick in is its own problem, and we walked through how to defuse it years early in a free guide here.) Each of these three funds pays every month, and each pulls income from a different engine so a single shock does not stop all three checks at once.
JEPI: Equity Exposure With a Monthly Paycheck
JEPI holds a large-cap U.S. equity portfolio (top positions include Broadcom at 1.8%, plus Ross Stores, Amazon, Apple, and Howmet Aerospace each near 1.7%) and overlays it with equity-linked notes that sell call options to generate income. Those premiums get distributed monthly. Over the trailing twelve months, JEPI paid out $4.58 per share, with the most recent monthly payment landing at $0.36664 on August 5, 2026. The fund charges 0.35%, meaning you keep about $996.50 of every $1,000 working. JEPI has also produced meaningful total return alongside its yield: shares are up 10.3% over the past year and 6.16% year to date. That combination is why it anchors the equity sleeve of an RMD-funding stack.
PFF: Preferred Securities for a Higher Coupon
PFF tracks an index of U.S. preferred stocks and hybrid income securities issued mostly by banks, insurers, and utilities. Preferreds sit above common stock in the capital structure and pay fixed distributions, which is exactly the profile a retiree wants when the goal is a predictable check. PFF distributes monthly, with a trailing 12-month total of $1.657 per share and an annualized forward figure of $1.708. The expense ratio is 0.45%. On a share price of $30.58, that produces one of the fattest yields you can get without dropping into junk bonds. The tradeoff is that preferreds behave like long-duration credit, so the price moves when rates move.
TFLO: Cash-Like Stability That Still Pays
TFLO holds only U.S. Treasury floating rate notes. Coupons reset weekly against short-term Treasury bill rates, so duration risk is essentially zero and credit risk is that of the U.S. government. With the Federal Reserve holding the upper-bound target at 3.75%, TFLO’s income remains healthy: it distributed $1.915 per share over the trailing twelve months, with a $0.159838 payment on August 6, 2026. The fund manages roughly $6.7 billion in net assets across eight Treasury FRN CUSIPs. Shares have moved a tight 2.42% year to date, which is the point. When equity markets wobble, TFLO’s principal barely notices, and the RMD gets funded anyway.
The Real Trade-Off
None of these funds is free of compromise. JEPI’s covered-call overlay caps upside in strong rallies, so if the S&P 500 gains 25%, you will lag. PFF is credit-sensitive and rate-sensitive at the same time; a spike in long yields or a bank scare hits the NAV. TFLO’s yield falls the moment the Fed cuts. You saw that in the data: TFLO paid $0.270936 in April 2024 when rates were higher, and payouts have drifted down since. Blending the three spreads those risks. For a retiree who wants the RMD funded from cash flow rather than share sales, that blend is the point.
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