The correct answer is      (C.)  General partners

You've likely heard of master limited partnerships (MLPs), a group of securities -- mostly pipeline companies -- that boast double-digit yields and double-digit dividend growth. But you may not be familiar with the groups behind these MLPs, the people that really run the show -- the general partner (or more accurately, the company that owns the general partner). Until recently, GPs offered dividend yields of about 4%-5%. But now that has changed, and the average yield of the nine strongest and highest-yielding GPs we've identified is a solid 10.8%. That's right, the yield for this group has risen +151% between 2007 and 2008.

These special securities were designed for one sole purpose -- to provide investors with a steady stream of rising income. Only a few years ago, you couldn't invest in these money-making machines, because they were the exclusive preserve of private equity firms and other insiders. But in the past three years, some GPs have started trading publicly in a bid to raise the capital needed to build the nation's energy infrastructure.

GPs typically own a 2% equity stake in an MLP, but that's not all. They also receive a special management fee in the form of legally binding incentive distribution rights. MLPs must pay out almost all their available cash each quarter to partners, including the GP. Most GPs are also organized as partnerships or LLCs, so they must also distribute the bulk of their cash flow (and sometimes i-units) to unitholders. And as the limited partner's distributions increase, however, the percentage take of the GP also increases, often to a maximum of 50%.

Although the doors are now open to the public, many investors are not yet aware of the tremendous income potential of these distribution growth dynamos. You would be hard pressed to find many other investments in today's markets with this kind of distribution growth. And the good news is GPs are built to generate increasing cash flow.

With all this in mind, StreetAuthority editor Carla Pasternak has identified nine top-yielding GPs in the latest issue of her High-Yield Investing newsletter. These GPs, which have seen their distributions grow as much as +35.4% and an average of +14.0% during 2008, may be just the ticket for income investors looking for faster distribution growth and potential share price appreciation. To learn the names of these GPs, and to learn more about the High-Yield Investing newsletter, please visit this link.