Dividend Update - April 2021


dividend growth investing | financial independence | freedom | dividends

It's the end of one month and the beginning of another so it's time for my favorite update: my dividend update.  These dividend updates reflect all dividends that I receive through my investing pursuits. I hope they 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 open up all sorts of possibilities. You can check my dividend income or progress pages to see what dedication to an investment plan can give you.

April was an amazing month not only because of the dividends that we received during the month, but most importantly because we welcomed the newest addition to our family.  A happy and healthy daughter, Audrey.  Our family of 4 is now a party of 5 with 3 little girls!

My writing will continue to take a backseat to spending time with our newest addition as well as the other two girls and my wife.  As anyone that has had a newborn in the household they kind of dictate how things go.  As such it's a nice bit of a breather to take from my nearly 10 years of blogging but come June I should start back at it as I'll be back at work and we can get into a bit more of a routine.

During April, my FI Portfolio produced $483.51 in dividends with my FolioFirst portfolio chipping in another $24.38. My Roth IRA added $62.79 while my Rollover IRA generated $259.82.  All told I received $507.89 across my taxable accounts and $830.50 across all accounts.

Making Money While I Sleep

The power of joining the ownership class is that those companies can work much harder for you than you can.  Think about it.  By myself I have to devote my own time to a job in order to make money.  However, by buying a stake in a high quality business I now get to leverage my own time that I exchanged for money into companies that are working around the clock to make products or provide services for their customers.  Those companies are working 24/7/365 which means that I make money even when I sleep.

During April the companies I own paid me $27.68 per day or $3.46 per hour assuming 8 hour work days every day of the month.  Year to date those numbers are $32.07 per day and $4.01 per hour.




FI Portfolio

As I mentioned above my FI Portfolio produced $483.51 in dividends during April.  That's a bit disappointing 6.5% decline compared to January, but a healthy 6.5% increase compared to April 2020.  

The quarterly decline was due to payout timing issues as there were some companies that have some oddball payout dates.  So not all companies that paid in January also paid in April.  I focus more on the year over year change which showed a nice 6.5% increase.

Year to date my FI Portfolio has produced $2,486.76 which is a miniscule 0.6% increase compared to the YTD numbers for 2020.  That's primarily due to my closing of some positions during 2020 as well as the handful of dividend cuts that were received last year as well.  Moving forward I expect 2021 to start pulling ahead for good.

Roth IRA

My Roth IRA generated $62.79 in dividends during April which is an excellent 14.8% increase compared to January and an even better 21.8% increase compared to April 2020.  Nearly all of the quarterly period increase was due to my purchase of RPM International (RPM) which also played a bit role in the year over year increase as well.

Through April the YTD total for my Roth IRA is showing an excellent 10.9% increase compared to 2020.  I still have a decent amount of cash ready to deploy in that account which should help to boost those numbers up even more as the capital gets put to work.

Rollover IRA

In March of 2019 I mentioned that I would start reporting on my Rollover IRA.  The bulk of those funds are invested in dividend growth companies, although there's a few that aren't, so to give the cleanest picture I will show just the dividend growth investments during my monthly reports.  That being said I'm not too worried about any particular month/quarter of dividends since my current plan is to be a bit more active with these funds than I would in my taxable accounts.  

My Rollover IRA produced $259.82 in dividends during April which was a 45.3% increase from January and an excellent 157.3% increase compared to April of last year.  The increase was largely due to additional purchases made throughout the last year as well organic dividend growth. 

The YTD total for 2021 sits at $1,072.95 which is a remarkable 49.7% increase compared to the same period of 2020.

Dividend Raises During the Month

April definitely came as a surprise with dividend increase announcements with 7 different companies announcing raises during the month.  That's way more than I expected going into the month which is always a nice bonus.  April saw 7 of my FI Portfolio holdings announce raises combining to boost my forward 12-month dividends by $60.61.  Year to date there's been 25 dividend raises increasing my forward 12-month dividends by a combined $269.15.

Dividend Increase Source

I've started breaking down the monthly dividend increase into its components: purchases, re-investment and dividend raises.  This lets me see what is the bigger contributor each month in my pursuit of financial independence.  I'm only tracking this for my main FI Portfolio since that is the portfolio that I want to ultimately provide the bulk of our income.
Dividend | Purchase | Stocks | Dividend Growth | Reinvestment

April was an incredible month in terms of increasing the forward 12-month dividends for my FI Portfolio which just continued the strong push to start the year.  New purchases led by far for the month adding $148.29 in expected dividends.  What I really like to see though is that dividend increases continued to add greater than $60 as they have every month thus far.  The purchases are a bit of a mis-representation as I did close two positions which reduced my forward dividends by a combined $102.56.  Most of that capital has been re-deployed already, but net of the sales purchases added $45.73 to my forward dividends.  Combined purchases, reinvestment and increases increased my FI Portfolio forward 12-month dividends by $220.75 during April and YTD they've risen by $578.57.

Looking Forward

My forward 12-month dividends for my FI Portfolio ended April at $8,154.33 while my FolioFirst forward dividends are at $175.01.  That pushes the total taxable account forward 12-month dividends up to $8,329.34.  My Roth IRA's forward-12 month dividends are at $769.92.  My Rollover IRA's forward 12-month dividends are at $3,639.37.  Across all 4 accounts, assuming no dividend cuts or position size changes, I can expect to receive at least $12,738.63 in dividends over the next year.

Monthly Average

The following chart shows the monthly dividend totals 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, as we saw above, and eventually some positions will get dropped, but the long-term trend is what matters.  

The rolling 12-month monthly average for my FI Portfolio ended April at $633.43 per month which is $1.29 higher or 0.2% increase compared to  2020's monthly average of $632.13.  
dividend growth investing | dividends | financial independence | freedom

Dividends Received Breakdown
Dividends | Financial Independence | Dividend Growth Investing

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

Are you on track to meet your dividend goals for the year?  

Let me know in the comments below!



Comments

  1. Hi JC,
    First and foremost, congrats on the growing family! I trust that your wife and baby are healthy and that the rest of you are adjusting well to the newest addition.
    Your dividend increases from Raises has been remarkably consistent thus far in 2021. Even better is that it's your leading contributor. It's good to see what dividend growth you can still expect, even if you chose not to invest any more $$$ into your portfolios.
    I didn't realize you'd recently purchased RPM. I've been a long-time holder of RPM and it's been a terrific investment for me. I'm always surprised that I don't find the stock in more portfolios. It's probably a result of the yield. However, total return is important, too, and it's shined for me in that regard. Anyway, I'm glad that I now have some company as an RPM shareholder.
    Lastly... Wow! 7 dividend raises in April. I had a measly 2 of them. Luckily, the one from PG was above expectations, and it made for a decent month on the raise front.

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