Stay Away From These Closed-End Funds

A truism made more valid today: Investing is not for the faint of heart. Most of the top-performing closed-end funds in August have crashed in the past few days.

Two that I would not touch have ties to energy. At 13.7%, no fund on the list did better than Tortoise Energy Capital(TYY Quote). With oil dropping to the $90s, the prospects for its holdings of Kinder Morgan (KMR Quote), Plains All American(PAA Quote), Enbridge Energy(EEP Quote) and Sunoco Logistics(SXL Quote) have gone south as well.

The other is from the emerging-market-income category. The Western Asset Emerging Markets Floating Rate Fund(EFL Quote) added 8.5% in August before giving it all back this month. ...