Weekly Roundup - April 17, 2016


Another week has already come and gone.  I don't know about you guys but the weeks just keep flying by faster and faster.  There wasn't much to report on with the portfolio this past week with the only real developments being some dividends rolled in, there were 3 increases announced and the latest batch of ESPP shares hit my account.  I'll be selling this latest group soon although the proceeds won't go towards anything fun like investing.  Just continue to build cash and maybe go to paying down some debt.

I spent the early part of the week finishing up our taxes which wasn't fun but it was a necessary evil.  No one wants Uncle Sam on their case for anything.  We're getting a $4k+ return this year which is great, although I try to get it to between $500-$1,000 because I'm not in the business of making interest free loans.  It seems like every year for the past 4 or so years is that we've had major changes that's complicated our taxes.

We got married in 2012, bought a house in 2013, had a kid in 2014 and unfortunately lots of medical bills and 2015 brought a major decrease in income (about $100k lower gross, OUCH!) between my wife quitting her job and me not working as much due to our son's health issues as well as a couple pay cuts along the way.  Not to mention the fact that my income is highly variable from month to month since I'm paid a small base salary but make my real money whenever I'm at work.  Hopefully 2016 will be a bit calmer for taxes so we can do some better planning, but I'm sure something else will pop up because it always does.
I've been reading Superforecasting and so far it's excellent.  One of the biggest lessons thus far in the book is to not let the results dictate the process.  That's so true with investing as well.  At times the results can blind you from a successful process that will work over the long term.  Now that doesn't mean you don't need to analyze the process for improvements but the results are only part of the equation in the analysis process.


Now that I'm home again I can get back to sharing some of the definitions from The Devil's Financial Dictionary by Jason Zweig (affiliate link).  For those that don't know the book is a nice little time killer that gives brutally honest and often humorous definitions of finance and investing terminology.

Today's word/definition is:
"Golden Parachute, n. - Although gold is extremely heavy, a parachute made of this substance nonetheless assures the wearer of a soft and comfortable landing even when flung in disgrace from the commanding heights of corporate headquarters.  "
I've never understood the golden parachute for CEOs and other executives.  History is littered with executives that made horrible decisions for the direction of their companies which leads to the company backtracking which leads to the CEO being kicked out and gifted with a nice multi-million dollar GTFO of here payday.  In any other position you just get fired, but the CEOs of these companies get set for life whenever they mess up.  Shareholders should be outraged by this.

Maybe I should set my sights for a CEO position because you honestly can't lose.  You make ridiculous amounts of money every year and if you mess up you win the lottery.  Win win!

Blogging/Writing

This was a pretty poor week for writing since it was another week at home and my focus/attention is always lacking.  Although that does give me a lot of time to listen, watch and read other things that I don't normally have the time for and I was able to pick up several new ideas for some posts.  Time to put pen to paper as they say.

For those that have already read my goals post one goal of mine is to move my blog to Wordpress and redesign my site.  I've been poking around Blogger's platform and noticed a couple templates that are similar to what I have in mind when I do the redesign/move so I'll probably experiment a bit with a new layout sometime this week and I hope you all give me some feedback.

Self Improvement

It wasn't the greatest of weeks for self improvement since the weather was very up and down and the honey do list still had plenty of items to cross off.  But tomorrow is another day and a new week is about to start so it's time to get back on track with my weight loss program.

On to the Roundup

In case you missed them, here's the posts from Passive-Income-Pursuit this past week.
Also, be sure to sign up to receive posts via email and to follow me on Twitter@JC_PIP so you don't miss anything.  I also started a Facebook page to give people another option for keeping up to date on posts and happenings with the blog.

Once again I'd like to say thanks to each and every one of you that read, commented, and shared posts from here this past week.  I think this dividend growth investing and financial independence community is amazing and the openness from everyone is awesome.  Thanks again!

Now on to the links!

Taking Time to Recharge by FI Fighter

Time to Sell Low Yielding Dividend Stocks? by DivHut

Why I Chose Dividend Growth Investing by Roadmap2Retire on Dividend Growth Investor

How Low Yield Dividend Stocks Can Fit Into a Dividend Growth Portfolio by The Dividend Guy on Sure Dividend

My Dividend Portfolio: Q1 2016 by Financially Integrated

Kansas Wanderings by Income Surfer

When it's better to think like a rich person by Our Next Life

How we increased our net worth by 250% in 5 years by Tawcan

The Most Complicated Stocks by A Wealth of Common Sense

A dozen things I've learned from Mary Meeker about investing by 25iq

Procter & Gamble's 1% Dividend Raise by The Conservative Income Investor

Also, if you're looking for investment ideas, A Frugal Family's Journey keeps a list of stock analyses and recent buys from fellow bloggers.

I hope you all have a great weekend!

Image courtesy of Gubgib on FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

Comments

  1. Superforcasting sounds interesting, I've added it to my reading list. Thanks for adding the Dividend Guy Article on Sure Dividend for this week's roundup!

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  2. Great list of article JC. Thanks for consistently posting this series. Aside from dividend income update posts, these types are my favorite.

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  3. Thank you for this list if great reads. I missed a couple during the week. As always, I appreciate the DivHut mention!

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  4. Hey JC,

    It's unfortunate that you guys always have tricky tax situations, working on mine here as well and it's the first year I started investing so a bunch of things to learn for me. Thanks for putting this list together man. Keep up the good work, rooting for you as CEO.

    DB

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  5. Hey, thanks for sharing your list of reads. Always nice to see the support for the rest of the community. Good on your for finding a silver lining; being able to read all this good content.

    Tristan

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