Dividend Update - February 2015


These dividend updates reflect all dividends that I receive through my investing pursuits and I hope can help inspire you to take control of your own finances and invest to build a passive income stream.  What you use that stream for is up to you, whether it's to fund early retirement, just provide some FI/FU money, or even to provide for an annual vacation; the key is that it can provide options and opens up all sorts of possibilities.  You can check my dividend income or progress page to see what dedication to an investment plan can give you.



I received a total of $356.74 in dividends in my FI Portfolio in February and a total of $596.05 so far this year.  Dividends received in my FI Portfolio had a fairly lackluster 0.8% growth from November 2014 but an excellent growth of 58.9% compared to February 2014.  Unfortunately I still don't own any companies that pay in the second month of each quarter within my Roth IRA so there was a big fat zero from that account.  However, I did receive $1.05 from my Loyal3 portfolio, Apple, that I started back in August 2014.  That was an 11.7% increase quarter over quarter.

Forward 12-month dividends for my FI Portfolio ended February at $5,198.12 $5,209.82 which is about a $37 increase from the end of January.  The increase is attributable to the dividend increase announcements by Coca-Cola (KO), United Technologies (UTX), PepsiCo (PEP), and Wal-Mart (WMT).  Adding in my Loyal3 Portfolio's forward dividends of $55.18 brings my total taxable accounts' forward dividends to $5,253.31 $5,265.00.  Forward dividends for my Roth IRA increased to $254.20 thanks to the aforementioned increase from Wal-Mart (WMT).

I haven't set any goals yet for dividends received or forward dividends because this is going to be a year of lots of changes.  There's plenty of changes with my job, my wife quitting hers, and taking care of our new son, so there's a lot of things that are in flux right now with my income and expenses leading which makes it difficult to have accurate goals to shoot for.  For the next few months I don't expect to see too much growth quarter over quarter while I reload my emergency fund.  I still have some capital available for purchases and hope to make at least one next week if the market allows.

The following chart shows the monthly dividend totals of my FI Portfolio only for each year that I've been investing as well as the monthly average.  It's not always an increase as some companies have weird payout schedules and eventually some positions will get dropped, but the long-term trend is what matters.  The average monthly dividends for the last three months, December 2014 - February 2015, is $448.20 which is well above 2014's average of $379.24 and slightly ahead of 4Q14's average of $445.07.  With more contributions/investments and expected dividend increases the gap should continue to widen.


FI Portfolio - Dividend Income
Company Dividend Amount DRIP Shares
Procter & Gamble (PG) $44.03 --
AT&T (T) $9.91 --
Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI) $98.30 --
Air Products & Chemicals (APD) $14.23 --
Realty Income (O) $17.33 --
HCP Inc. (HCP) $45.85 --
Vodafone (VOD) $14.28 --
General Mills (GIS) $26.76 --
Verizon (VZ) $23.65 --
Starbucks (SBUX) $8.99 --
Yum Brands (YUM) $17.26 --
Deere & Company (DE) $36.15 --
February Total $356.74
2015 Total $596.05

I've updated my Dividend Income page to reflect February's changes.

Comments

  1. Solid year over year improvement! Your graph with now five different calendar years is awesome, showing how far you've come since you started this journey.

    Good to have you back, and best of luck in the big month of March!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. w2r,

      It's funny because it doesn't seem like I'm starting on my 5th year of DGI. Well I guess technically I'm still closing out my 4th year since I started in September 2011. It's great to have the dividends really start to pick up steam. I'm getting over $1k per quarter now, and while that's still a long way from where I need to end up, that's still at least an extra purchase each quarter. I expect to have a solid March and can't wait to see what the rest of the year has in store.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  2. Way to go, JC. Congrats on the dividend income.

    R2R

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. R2R,

      Thanks. I had some great growth year over year thanks to all of the investing I did last year. Hopefully here soon I can start plowing money back into the markets to build up my dividends even more.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  3. I know you'll gonna do it up JC. Intensity is fierce more than ever! Keep Rocking it bud. I'm with you all the way. Take care my friend

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hustler,

      Intensity and commitment will take you far in most endeavors. Just doing my best to remain focused and always learn.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  4. Despite the amount your year over year total is huge. March looks to be a big one for you.

    Good on you to fall back on your emergency fund so many people skip out on.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A-G,

      I always wish the total would be higher but I'm quite pleased with the year over year growth. Quarter over quarter growth is a little trickier because the timing of payouts comes into play since some companies have weird payout schedules. But overall I'm happy and continuing to march forward. Now I just need the market to pull back just a bit more to make a few scheduled buys.

      The emergency fund is vital to being able to survive financially. I'm so glad that I kept a large amount of cash in my savings account and even started to bulk it up a bit more since we knew that it would be a long process for Luke. Having the emergency fund really allowed us to focus on what was most important at the time which was/is our son.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  5. JC,

    That's a really, really solid month up there. You and I had similar dividend income for February. Gotta love that KMI position, right? :)

    Keep up the great work. I can imagine that it's a little difficult to forecast goals and all that right now. But stocks will still be around when you're ready to get back to aggressive buying and all that.

    Take care!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. DM,

      KMI has certainly treated us nicely over the past few years and I expect several more great years to come. Looking forward to your February dividends post. It's always great to see how well other bloggers have done.

      Year, forecasting is difficult right now but it'll be better once everything settles down in a few months. I'll still probably invest some along the way even though I'm looking to try and build up some more cash but there's still plenty of cash set aside for emergencies.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  6. You had a great January even better February, March is going to be a monster! I love seeing increasing dividends with my fellow investors, it shows a living proof of how FI can be done.
    Keep it up!
    PS
    Love the graph! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. F2FF,

      It's been a great start to the new year so far and I'm looking forward to what the rest of the year brings. Sadly it looks like March will be a decrease from December, mainly because of the timing of payments and weird payout schedules from some of my positions. One chop at a time to get that FI tree knocked down!

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  7. Fantastic numbers for February! You are indeed picking up steam year over year, so I'm looking forward to seeing how 2015 will compare to 2014. Best of luck in March!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. SAG,

      The year over year growth was great and it should just continue to improve. Even assuming that I make no investments this year and no other holdings announce increases my dividends should come in almost $660 higher than 2014's total. So I expect to have a pretty solid annual increase again by the end of 2015.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  8. Nice YoY numbers. Looking forward to watching the snowball.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Adam,

      My portfolio is really starting to take on a life of it's own. I can't wait until the day that my monthly dividends are averaging $1k because that'll essentially bring an extra purchase each month to my portfolio. That's huge in the long run. I'm almost halfway to that mark based on forward dividends monthly average and the good thing is that each dividend increase announcement gets me that much closer.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  9. Fantastic month, JC! It must feel good to know your portfolio is working hard for you even if you can't contribute as much as usual. You've already hit that critical mass point where it's feeding itself...Thanks for sharing!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ryan,

      That was one of the beautiful things about taking the time off to be at the hospital. I still read up on some of the companies I owned but for the most part I didn't do anything for 12 weeks. And in the meantime the companies I owned just continued to pay me a portion of the profits and it helped to build up my cash position in my portfolio.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  10. That's some fantastic dividend income JC, even if you're still a long way off your goal. Awesome to see the long-term progress, and the rewards you reap when you stick at this for the long term!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jason,

      There's a long ways to go but I've come pretty far over the almost 4 years that I've been investing. Even better is that eventually the dividends will take on a life of their own and hopefully start funding at least 2 purchases per quarter, right now it's about 1 per quarter.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  11. Nice dividend income for the month, especially for February. I love the chart too - it paints a great picture of the dividend growth in action.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Christian Investor,

      February was a pretty solid month, now if only I could get it up to my March levels. DGI is definitely a long term investment plan and I really like that chart because it shows every month compared to its' previous year. Consistency is key for DGI.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  12. Hi JC,

    Congrats on a great month - it's encouraging to see the projected numbers increase all by themselves without additional investments needed. I'm also curious which month will require a higher vertical scale on your monthly dividend totals chart ... September maybe?

    Best wishes to you and your family,
    -DL

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dividend Life,

      It was definitely nice to see them start increasing again after the decrease in January from the end of 2014. I really don't know when I could cross the $1k barrier although September sounds like a good time to shoot for.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  13. Nice YOY numbers. Looking forward to watching you March numbers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Financial Freedom,

      It was solid YoY growth but I expect to see those numbers trend down over the next few months because I haven't made any purchases since Oct/Nov of last year, although I did make another purchase yesterday. That will hurt the growth in the short term but it was a necessary evil. By Q3/4 I expect to start putting up solid YoY growth again since I'll have dividend growth and fresh investment capital put to work.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete
  14. Very solid YOY numbers. Your forward looking dividend is looking pretty solid too. Congrats, definitely keep up the good work. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tawcan,

      The YoY growth was great in both percentage terms and dollar value. I've got a lot of work to do to reach FI by 40 but I'm well on my way.

      Thanks for stopping by!

      Delete

Post a Comment