Check Out Bill Gates' Top-Yielding Stocks

Many investors aren't aware that the stock portfolio of Bill Gates, America's wealthiest man, is a matter of public record. Gates invests in the stock market through a trading vehicle called Cascade Investment Group.

Stockpickr decided to sort through Cascade's stockholdings and extract the stocks with the highest yields. These are the stocks that pay dividends to Gates.

One of the high-yielding stocks that Gates owns is PNM Resources(PNM Quote), a company that generates and distributes electricity and natural gas in New Mexico and Texas. Just over two weeks ago, Jefferies & Co. upgraded the stock from hold to buy. The stock, which has a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 14 and a P/E-to-growth (PEG) ratio of 1.7, pays a generous yield of 3.8%.

PNM was recently added to the portfolio of Lord Abbett Small-Cap Value Y (LRSYX), which is rated five stars by Morningstar. This fund, which invests at least 80% of its net assets in equity securities of small companies in the Russell 2000, has generated an average annual return of 18% over the last three years. The fund also owns Quanex(NX Quote), a vehicle and building products company that offers a yield of 1.2%, and Black Hills(BKH Quote), an electric utility that serves South Dakota, Wyoming and Montana, yielding 3.1%.

Another high-yield stock Gates owns is Otter Tail(OTTR Quote), a Minnesota-based electric utility that also delves into such diverse businesses as manufacturing polyvinyl chloride and polyethylene pipes, wind towers, diagnostic medical equipment, patient-monitoring equipment and dehydrated potato products. The stock offers a P/E of 21, a PEG of 4.2 and a yield of 3.2%.

Otter Tail is also featured in Sleepers, an interesting portfolio on Stockpickr that also contains MDU Resources Group(MDU Quote), which yields 2.1%, and Applied Materials(AMAT Quote), which yields 1.2%.