It's that time of the month again! A few days late but here's my first monthly update in 2015. What a month it was. The ECB decided to act on continued fears of deflation and will pour over a trillion euro's in the market in the coming years. This decision resulted in a lower euro and rising stock prices in Europe. However the opposite seemed to happen to US stocks in the past month.
All in all a hectic month. However, since I am in it for the long haul I am not too interested in these daily or monthly fluctuations. What matters is that I keep focused on buying high quality companies which provide me with a steady stream of growing dividends.
Purchases
I purchased shares of Royal Dutch Shell earlier this month.
Dividends received
Three separate companies paid me dividends during this month.
My 12-month forward dividend rate is now €900, compared to €788 last month. My purchase of RDS.A added around €60 and the rest comes from a cheaper Euro. However, since I am not exchanging USD dividend to EUR this does not mean anything in economic terms for me. I reinvest USD in USD-listed companies so this increase in dividend income is purely cosmetic for now.
Seeking Alpha articles
In the past month I wrote 3 articles for Seeking Alpha.
How was your month? What are your plans for the coming month? Which companies are you looking at to add to your portfolio?
All in all a hectic month. However, since I am in it for the long haul I am not too interested in these daily or monthly fluctuations. What matters is that I keep focused on buying high quality companies which provide me with a steady stream of growing dividends.
Indicator
| As of 29-12 | As of 31-1 | % change |
|---|---|---|---|
| S&P 500 Total Return | 3,827 | 3,656 | -4.5% |
| Dow Jones Industrials Total Return | 36,081 | 34,767 | -3.6% |
| AEX GR | 1,244 | 1,314 | +5.6% |
| USD.EUR | 0.8227 | 0.8834 | +7.4% |
| Portfolio value | € 22,390 | € 23,386 | +4.4% |
Purchases
I purchased shares of Royal Dutch Shell earlier this month.
Dividends received
Three separate companies paid me dividends during this month.
- WMT: 20 shares @ $0.48 for a total of $9.60
- BAX: 22 shares @ $0.52 for a total of $11.44
- PM: 17 shares @ $1.00 for a total of $17.00
Total: around €27 after tax which is 17% more than last year. Not a really big increase compared to earlier months. I expect next month to see a bigger annual increase.
Dividend increases
None.
Dividend increases
None.
Yearly forward dividend
Seeking Alpha articles
In the past month I wrote 3 articles for Seeking Alpha.
How was your month? What are your plans for the coming month? Which companies are you looking at to add to your portfolio?
Big or small, its always great to see growth. Keep up the great work Dividend Dream. Thanks for sharing your progress. Also, thanks for sharing your recent Seeking Alpha articles. I've already read two and plan on reading the other one sometime tomorrow.
ReplyDeleteBest wishes and continued success! AFFJ
Hi FFJ, thanks for stopping by and taking the time to leave a comment. I hope you like my 3rd article as well!
DeleteHey Dividend Dream,
ReplyDeleteThis is good progress and it seems that we are at a similar stage in terms of dividend stream. Keep up with the savings / blogging. I will follow you :-)
Hi LTI, thanks for reading. Obviously I wish you well in your investment endeavors!
DeleteLooks like your portfolio did well even in a down market. Nicely done adding RDS shares and congrats on the dividend income.
ReplyDeleteR2R
Hi R2R, how nice of you to visit my blog again. Yeah, it was nice to see that my portfolio turned out fine.The biggest contributor to that is the weaker Euro.We'll see how that turns out in the next months.
DeleteConsidering how volatile the market has been recently managing a gain is a welcome surprise. Of course those dividends received help manage to smooth things out as well. Thanks for sharing your recent update.
ReplyDeleteHi Keith Park, thanks for taking the time to read my dividend update. Well, managing a gain was not my intention but I guess it's not the worst problem in the world.
DeleteNice start to the year with a 17% YoY increase. Writing for SA will provide a decent sized chunk to your investable capital so keep at it. I'll try and read through them this weekend after I work on getting all my spreadsheets caught up from the last 3 months. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteHi PIP, thanks for taking the time to read my dividend update. I imagine you have other, more important things to do. I read one of your last blog posts. Keep it up!
DeleteGood results for a month, considering how poor January 2015 was. Do you invest in currency too (just wondering since you are listing the USD/EUR rate.
ReplyDeleteHi Martin! No I don't invest directly in currency but the currency rates do affect my current networth in euro's (at least on paper).
DeleteEvery increase for income is a good thing!
ReplyDeleteKeep it going!
cheers!
Cheers Anha, thanks for your comment. I wish you well!
DeleteNice progress. I like the dividend chart and your comparison to indexes.
ReplyDelete