Weekly Roundup - March 29, 2014

I've been a bit absent the past week or so and even missed my normal weekly roundup post last weekend.  Never fear though I'm back and have a new installment of the roundup.  My FI Portfolio has been performing great the last two weeks and I even found some opportunities to invest a bit more capital in an otherwise very heated market.  First I purchased some more shares of Kinder Morgan, Inc.  In short, there was a big stink about maintenance capex but a lot of the claims were pretty much unfounded.  No worries though for the long-term investor as short term bad news provides great buying opportunities.  And then this past week I purchased some more shares of General Electric.  I've been eyeing opportunities to average down since I purchased shares but they just haven't shown up so I went ahead an averaged up my cost basis by a little bit.  General Electric is a huge industrial powerhouse so I was glad to get a bit more exposure there.

Since my main goal is to retire through dividend growth investing, what really gets my heart aflutter is dividend increase announcements.  And March was great for that with 6 of my holdings announcing increases including the much awaited increase from the token $0.01 that Bank of America has been paying since the Great Recession.  The new quarterly dividend is $0.05 which still isn't spectacular but it's back on the right track.  Management tried to give a higher dividend than $0.05 but was turned down by the Fed.  This is probably for the better as there's still more litigation issues to settle from the financial crisis/housing bubble.  Either way I'm excited about all the dividend increases!  With the purchases and increases I'm now well over $4,100 in forward 12-month dividends which is awesome.  That's over $340 every month!


Also in case you missed it, Baxter International (BAX) is going to follow in the footsteps of Abbot Laboratories and split into two companies.  The company will be split into a pharmaceutical company and a medical products company.  The split won't be completed until mid-2015 but I'm looking forward to it.

One more in case you missed it.  I posted a stock analysis on McDonald's Corporation over at Seeking Alpha so if you're interested go and give it a read and let me know what you think.  I'm planning on going through YUM! Brands next and then I'm not quite sure where I'll be going next.  So if you have any ideas feel free to pass them along.

Thanks again to everyone that stopped by, commented and shared posts from here this past week.  It still amazes me that anyone would want to follow along with my journey.  As always if there's topic you'd like to see covered more often feel free to let me know in the comments or using the contact form on the sidebar of this page.

A special thanks to Zach from DividendLadder for his post about three dividend stocks with growth potential.

I missed last weeks roundup so this one will be a bit longer.  Now on to the links!

Why I'm Not Afraid of Failing by FI Fighter - Whether you want are striving to build a business or reaching for financial independence/early retirement.  What's the worst that can happen?  You fail but learned great lessons along the way?  Get out there and give yourself a chance.  If you resign yourself to ordinary, that's all you're going to get.

20 Favorite Dividend Growth Stocks from 20 Dividend Growth Bloggers by Dividend Growth Stock Investing - This is a great list of companies and even better is getting to find some other dividend growth blogs that I didn't already follow.  Any ideas which was the favorite?

Goal Setting - A Look at Forward 12-month Dividends by Write Your Own Reality - Forward 12-month dividends are my favorite portfolio stat to track.  I get to see how much closer I am to reaching financial independence with each purchase and each dividend increase.

Why I Sold this Dividend Stock for a Loss by Clear Eyes Investing - In case you thought you were the next Warren Buffett, chances are you're not.  The longer you invest the more likely it is you'll make a bad decision on either the buy side (buying too richly) or the sell side (waiting too long to dump a loser).  Know that truth before you invest so you can come up with a plan for how you'll deal with it and recover.  You can learn from your investing wins, but you'll learn a lot more from your investing losses; so take them as they are which is a great learning opportunity.

Retirement Strategy Revisited by Retire Before Dad - While coming up with a retirement plan is important, even more so if you're seeking early retirement, nothing gets set in stone.  Plans and ideas change and sometimes you find new to you investment or income sources.

Selective Dividend Reinvestment vs DRIP by Dividend Mantra - This is something that's crossed the mind of just about every dividend growth investor that I know.  Is it better to collect all dividends in cash and reinvest in the best values you see or just automatically reinvest into the paying company?  I'm still torn on this and have some of my positions set up for both ways.

JNJ Stock Dividend Analysis by Brick By Brick Investing - Marvin took a break last year because life just plain got too busy to keep up with a blog as well.  Thankfully he's back and providing some great analysis.  This time he looked at a lot of dividend growth investors' favorite JNJ.  I really like the easy to read infographic showing some of the historical metrics of the company.

March Dividend Increases by Compounding Income - As a dividend growth investor, I love a dividend increase as much as each of you.  I own 4 of the 6 that he mentioned so March treated me quite well.

Should dividend investors invest in index funds? by Dividend Growth Investor - With excess capital you can either invest in index funds or go the DIY route.  I prefer the DIY route because even the small fees from index funds will still add up to a lot more than a solidly built buy and monitor portfolio.  I only hold invest in index funds in my 401k and other retirement accounts but for my FI Portfolio, it's obviously DIY DGI all day, every day.

Picking Through Stocks in Beaten Down Sectors by Income Surfer - The markets are continuing their roll from the beginning of 2013 pushing a lot of dividend growth companies to fair value at best.  There's still areas of value but it's not as broad based as before.  As such one place to go looking for investments is through the unloved sectors at the moment.

Is there any value out there? by Financially Integrated - This is a question that I think a lot of investors have been asking lately.  Starting at the beginning of 2013 the stock markets, and our beloved dividend growth stocks, have generally seen a large increase in share price.  There's usually still pockets of value in any bull market, it's just that sometimes you have to really look for them.  Check out the post to see what companies he's interested in.

One last thing, if you want to receive posts by email go on and sign up for my mailing list.  I'm also working on getting a monthly newsletter out as well, hopefully with the first installment coming in early April.  There's a few other things that I'm working on but those will have to remain secret for now.  But if you sign up for the posts/newsletter you'll be the first to hear about what's in store.

I hope you all have a great weekend!

Comments

  1. Thanks for the mention JC! Enjoy your weekend as well!

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    1. w2r,

      No problem. Unfortunately I'll be stuck at work but thanks to the time change I finally have sunlight on my time off.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  2. Thanks so much for the inclusion. I didn't get a weekly recap done this week, on account of our newborn. Have a great weekend
    -Bryan

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    Replies
    1. Bryan,

      Not a problem and it's completely understandable. Enjoy the time with the newborn!

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  3. Thank you for including me in your review PIP. Most of my net worth is invested in dividend paying stocks, and just like you I plan on retiring through dividend paying stocks.

    However, I have no other choice but purchase index funds for my 401 (k). If I could do dividend stocks in the 401K, I would do it right away, but my plan doesn't allow it. Plus I get tax deductions with the 401K and a pretty decent match

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. DGI,

      I wish I could invest in individual stocks in my 401k, but alas that's not an option. So it's index funds for me.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  4. Pursuit,

    Interesting move by BAX. It looks like they're following in the footsteps of others, perhaps most notably Abbott Labs. I won't make the same mistake as I did last time; I'll keep both sides of BAX this time around, assuming future prospects appear favorable for both companies.

    Thanks for the mention. Much appreciated!

    Hope you're having a great weekend. It's rainy here, and I'm tired after a long week. Relaxation time now. :)

    Best wishes.

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    Replies
    1. DM,

      The day it was announced I had seen that BAX was a top mover in the pre-market action and was up like 8-9% so I was curious what big news could have been announced. And then blam, a split into two companies. I much prefer the medical products company but I might keep both to see if the pharmaceuticals can perform well. I'll have to do a lot more research on the pharma side.

      Weather's great here, but unfortunately I'm stuck at work. At least I have some daylight now when I'm done for the day since we had the time change.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  5. Thanks for the mention brother, it has been quite a while but my son is almost walking and sleeping through the night so plan on seeing a lot more of me around =)

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    Replies
    1. Marvin,

      It's good to have you back and it's amazing how quickly time passes. I'm sure it goes even faster with a little one running around. I know of two other bloggers that had babies this past week so that's going to be a big change for them. I hope they can manage to keep up with their own blogs but I know a newborn is going to be a whole new experience.

      Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your weekend!

      Delete
  6. PIP,
    I'm also very excited about the new BAC dividend. I've owned since 2004 and waited patiently for a more significant dividend to return. .05 is not much, but I think its a new era of dividend growth ahead. Nice bump to the forward income. Thanks for the mention.
    -RBD

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    Replies
    1. RBD,

      I've seen some concerns over whether BAC will return to a DG stock but I find it pretty good news that Moynihan tried to pay a $0.05 last year and then tried to go higher than $0.05 this year. To me it's a sign that they want to return to continual DG.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  7. March is the great month for my portfolio too. I didn't count, but many of my holding increased their distributions. "Let the money work for us". :D

    Also, I like the post 'Retirement Strategy Revisited' by Retire Before Dad. It makes me to create a clear retirement strategy plan.

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  8. Thanks for the mention! Hope you had a great weekend!

    ReplyDelete

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