Dividend report: December 2020

I am two weeks later, but we're done with December! It's the last time of the year for a monthly update. Let's see how many companies sent me a dividend check for my ownership. These checks are the results of decisions I made earlier in life, sometimes years ago, where I decided to purchase shares in these companies. Nowaydays I still collect these checks but I have to do absolutely nothing to receive them. They just get deposited in my brokerage account, no questions asked. Isn't that great?!

Compared to last year my dividend income more or less remained the same. I received about € 154 after taxes, compared to € 158 last year. In total I got paid by 13 different companies. Some of my holdings showed some dividend growth. TROW is the biggest autonomous dividend grower, the rest of the bigger increase is due to additional share purchases. The decline in income is explained by a change in the USD.EUR exchange rate. Without the 9% decline in USD.EUR I would have had a 4% increase in dividend income. But hey, who cares!

In total I received about € 1.450 in dividens, which is 8% more than last year. That is rather disappointing but given the circumstances of last year not too bad. Dividend growth was muted in most cases and I even experienced some cuts. The decline in USD.EUR did the rest.  But I guess that gives a lot of room for improvement in 2021. I am bit behind my medium to long term goals so I better step up and increase the pace.

How was your month? what are your plans for this year?

Recent buy: Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY)

On one of the last days of 2020 I added a position in Bristol-Myers Squibb (ticker: BMY). I wanted to strengthen the healthcare part of my portfolio. I only held JNJ and Baxter and wanted to diversify a bit further by adding a big pharmaceutical company to my roster.

I hesitated between purchasing shares of Bristol-Meyers, Pfizer or Abbvie. I compared their yields, valuation and other financial indicators but the differences were actually rather limited. I find it difficult to judge how their pipelines look and what I can expect in terms of future revenue growth between these companies. In the end, I went with BMY because of their slightly better valuation. Their ex-dividend date is actually today (not really a coincidence) so I expect to receive my first dividend payment February 1.

I added 22 shares for about $61,60 per share. This purchase will add roughly € 35 to my annual dividend income stream which stands at around € 1.840 pre-tax.

What do you think of my purchase?

Dividend raise: Realty Income and Aflac

I totally forgot about these two raises weeks ago but for the sake of full transparancy and completeness of my journey, I'll post 'em.

A few weeks ago Aflac has raised their dividend by a whopping 18%! This is much higher compared to their raises earlier in 2020 and 2019 which were around 4%. Because I added to my position in Aflac earlier this year, this raise will add more than € 13 to my annual dividend income. That's the biggest raise in absolut terms I have ever received from a public company. The new dividend will be paid in Q1 2021 for the first time, so I will count this as a raise in 2021.

More recently, Realty Income Corporation (Realty Income, NYSE: O) announced its Board of Directors has declared an increase in the company's common stock monthly cash dividend to $0.2345 per share from $0.234 per share. This raise adds a whopping € 0,12 to my annual dividend income. Ka-ching!

All jokes aside, Realty Income increases their dividend on more than one occasion each year. Last year they raised the dividend 5 times. I will count this as their first raise in 2021. Hopefully there's more to come next year!

Dividend report: November 2020

We're already done with November! Let's see how many companies sent me a dividend check for my ownership. These checks are the results of decisions I made earlier in life, sometimes years ago, where I decided to purchase shares in these companies. Nowaydays I still collect these checks but I have to do absolutely nothing to receive them. They just get deposited in my brokerage account, no questions asked. Isn't that great?!

Compared to last year my dividend income more or less remained the same. I received about € 87 after taxes, compared to € 92 last year. In total I got paid by 5 different companies. Three of my holdings showed some dividend growth albeit small. The decline in income is explained by a change in the USD.EUR exchange rate.



I am still ahead compared to the cumulative total I received last year till now. I still aim for an increase this year, but it won't be a growth of 40% as targeted but maybe something like 10%. We'll see what happens! In the meantime, I just keep grinding away, putting money to work and reap the rewards down the line.

How was your month? Do you see values in the current marketplace?

Recent buy: Brink

Last week I purchased 20 additional shares of the company I work for. I work as a real estate and finance consultant for a mid sized management and consulting firm. I like my job very much! It offers me a lot of interesting and challenging projects in the field of real estate and area development. I love solving and optimizing these financial puzzles with Excel spreadsheets but also to be able to give customers quality advice about how to act. I wrote about it last year as well.

My company has been profitable for at least the last 15 years, even during the big downturn in 2009-2010. The company is fully owned by its employees. There are no outsider shareholders. I really like that, because the interests as shareholders and colleagues are aligned most of the time. If the company performs well financially, everyone profits, whether you are a shareholder or not.

My company has a policy to distribute its earnings based on a threshold for the capitalization rate of at least 30%. Excess funds are distributed as dividends in two payments: a bigger one of 75% just after the financial year has ended and a final payment at the shareholder meeting a few months later.

The valuation of my company is based on a 5.5x multiple of the last three years earnings and the forecast for next year's earnings. Its dividend yield based on last year's dividend is almost 9%. My purchase of 20 additional shares adds roughly € 150 to my annual dividend income (before taxes). My annual dividend income currently hovers around € 1.850,-.

As of now this position is about 11% of my portfolio and 25% of my dividend income. My plan is to purchase new stocks to further diversify my portfolio. I am able to purchase shares in my company once a year, so hopefully I can purchase another batch next year!

Would you consider purchasing shares in your own company?

Dividend Report: October 2020

We're done with October! Let's see how many companies sent me a dividend check for my ownership. These checks are the results of decisions I made earlier in life, sometimes years ago, where I decided to purchase shares in these companies. Nowaydays I still collect these checks but I have to do absolutely nothing to receive them. They just get deposited in my brokerage account, no questions asked. Isn't that great?!

Compared to last year my dividend income increased by more than 20%. It's mostly because of my recent purchase of CSCO. I received about € 43 after taxes, compared to € 35 last year. In total I got paid by 5 different companies. Most of my holdings showed some dividend growth albeit small.

I am still ahead compared to the cumulative total I received last year till now. I still aim for an increase this year, but it won't be a growth of 40% as targeted but maybe something like 10%. We'll see what happens! In the meantime, I just keep grinding away, putting money to work and reap the rewards down the line.

How was your month? Do you see values in the current marketplace?

Dividend Report: September 2020

We're done with September! Let's see how many companies sent me a dividend check for my ownership. These checks are the results of decisions I made earlier in life, sometimes years ago, where I decided to purchase shares in these companies. Nowaydays I still collect these checks but I have to do absolutely nothing to receive them. They just get deposited in my brokerage account, no questions asked. Isn't that great?!

Compared to last year my dividend income remained fairly in place, what isn't exactly a great thing to be honest. I received about € 180 after taxes, compared to € 190 last year. In total I got paid by 15 different companies. Most of my holdings showed some dividend growth albeit small. Too bad I had two nasty cuts earlier this year (RDS and BBL). But I am happy with my new dividend payers JNJ and BIP , and increased dividend payments by Unilever and Aflac because of purchases earlier this year

I am still ahead compared to the cumulative total I received last year till now. However the trend is not in the right direction. I still aim for an increase this year, but it won't be a growth of 40% as targeted but maybe something like 10%. We'll see what happens! In the meantime, I just keep grinding away, putting money to work and reap the rewards down the line.

How was your month? Do you see values in the current marketplace?