quarterly dividend updates

Dividend Investing for me is a long-term strategy. I like to buy great companies at good value based on historical metrics and dividend safety. Hold them for a long time, re-invest dividends and wait for compounding to do its magic. In contrast with Q1, Q2 2020 has been great for investors. From the bottom in March, the indexes almost rebounded back to their pre-Covid levels. I cannot and won’t even try to figure out what happens next. All I am planning to do is to keep buying stocks and ETF’s.  Here is my Q2 2020 quarterly dividend update:

Total: $727 for Q2 2020 (up 40% from Q2 2019 & up 2% from Q1 2020 )

Here is a graphical view of the same data:

Check out my and download/make your own dividend tracking sheet here and create awesome graphs as above for free.

My Buys in Q2 2020

So, the volatile market has offered some great opportunities! Frankly speaking I was not a 100% prepared to think about what to buy. I definitely had some stocks in my watch list, but I had not looked at them in a long time. Plus I got busy with a lot of work and so did not get much time to research any new stocks. So, at first I decided to add to my existing open positions which I thought were at attractive valuation. I also added a new stock to my portfolio.

• Added to position in A.O. Smith (AOS) in 30’s and low 40’s. They have had issues with revenue drop off in China since 2019. However, I like the safety of their dividend and their expansion in India. Eventually, they should get back to growth in revenues.
• Added to my Cisco Systems Inc. (CSCO) position. You can read more about my complete research on Cisco Systems here.
• I added to my position in Kontoor Brands (KTB). This is one of few stocks that is still around its March lows. They ended up having to cut their dividend. Because of this a lot of dividend based funds had to force sell this stock putting pressure on their stock price. This is still a long term hold for me. Full research here.
• Started a position in Monmouth Real Estate Corp. (MNR). This is a REIT that is focused on industrial properties. They only have investment grade clients like FDX, AMZN, KO, HD, RTX etc. They even collected 98-99% rent during the last 3 months. Bought some at starting yields of 6.9 % and then added a bit more during the quarter.
• I also added to my position in Starbucks (SBUX) in my Roth after selling some of my position form a taxable account.
• Added to my position in Wells Fargo (WFC) in 20 & 30’s.
• I used to have a small position outside my 401K in VTI before the crisis. However, last 3 months saw stocks go down so fast and come back up very fast. Working a full time job and researching what individual stocks to buy was looking difficult. I was just not finding enough time. So, I added to my existing positions which I had looked at before and opened new positions in MNR and HON only. But, throughout the crisis, I added big to my VTI position. No need to think/research much before adding to it. I am planning to continue adding to it every month. Since it will become a big part in my portfolio with all the buys, I also plan to add it to my statistics for every quarter.

I am projecting an increase to 2900$ in forward annual dividends as compared to 2103$ I made in 2019!

My Sells in Q2 2020

• I sold my Starbucks SBUX position in taxable account and bought it in my Roth.
• Sold my small CSCO position in taxable account and bought some in my Roth.
• I had a small position in Trow Price (TROW). I decided to sell that from my taxable account and will focus more on my Blackrock Inc. (BLK) position.

I did have Kontoor Brands (KTB) and Disney(DIS) cut dividends in Q2 2020 to preserve cash. Both business were challenged by the virus and seems like a relevant action to take. I decided to not cut them in my portfolio as I still think they will bounce back from this over the long term.

Thoughts about Q3 2020

Upcoming quarter will have Q2 earnings from most companies in my portfolio. We will get to know more impact of the virus on companies. In the last week, we have had a steep rise in cases in many US states. Some states have hit a pause on reopening and some brought few restrictions back. It will be interesting to see if states want to close economies again or just carry on and not go back to the lock down people experienced in last 3 months. I know one thing for sure: I will keep buying stocks and ETF’s during this quarter.

Check out my complete dividend portfolio here.

Click this link for my 2019 Annual dividend income update.

Dividends stocks do come with some risk, but with precautions you can avoid the risky one’s and choose the best dividend paying/growing stocks for your portfolio. I prepared a guide where I discuss some key ratios, fundamentals, some important resources to look at while deciding to buy a dividend stock. Also find out how to get free access to Morningstar, Value Line, workaround paywall behind popular news sites like Seeking Alpha etc.  Consider signing up for free instant access to the pdf version of the insights into dividend investing.

Dividend Investing for me is a long-term strategy. I like to buy great companies at good value based on historical metrics and dividend safety. Hold them for a long time, re-invest dividends and wait for compounding to do its magic. This quarter though, I decided to focus and keep/move more of my dividend stocks in my and my wife’s Roth accounts. So I did end up selling in small quantities wherever it made sense in my taxable accounts. Ideally I would like to buy and never sell. Here is my Q2 2019 quarterly dividend update and comparison with Q2 2018.

Total: $516.76 for Q2 2019

Here is a graphical view of the same data:

My Buys in Q2 2019

• Bought about double my existing position in A.O. Smith(AOS) when 2 firms released short articles and the stock price went down to low 40’s. My original position was in my taxable account. This year I am focused on moving a lot of my taxable dividend positions to Roth accounts. This seemed like a good opportunity to do it.
• Doubled my position in AbbVie Inc. (ABBV ) after they announced they are buying Allergen Plc (AGN) and it fell by 16%. Dividend is still pretty safe. They even announced plan to further focus on dividends.  New company will have 18-19 billion in cash flows which is probably the main reason for the deal(diversification of revenue of course). Huge debt now becomes a concern now.  I am planning to watch this like a hawk. Need to see debt go down next year as they mentioned in their presentation.

 I would expect my Q3 quarterly dividend update to reflect higher dividends with the help of these buys.

My Sells in Q2 2019

• Sold my small position in Coca-Cola Company(KO) at gain from my taxable account, purely to move proceeds to Roth. I might start building a position back in KO but not at these prices.
• Sold my small position in Vodafone Plc(VOD) at loss from my taxable account, again moving proceeds to Roth. Plus this was leading to some dividend being withheld and not being able to re-invest dividends owing to foreign entity in my broker’s account.
• Sold my 1 stock position in Apple Inc.(AAPL) at gain from my taxable account again to move money to Roth. I would like to start a position again in this maybe if it gets back to Dec-Jan 145$ prices.
• Sold some of my position in National Instruments(NATI) from my taxable account. I just sell some of this position when it becomes too large, to reduce risk of too much of 1 stock.

Check out my complete dividend portfolio here.

Click this link for my Q1 2019 dividend update.

Check out my and download/make your own dividend tracking sheet here.

Dividends stocks do come with some risk, but with precautions you can avoid the risky one’s and choose the best dividend paying stocks for your portfolio. I prepared a guide where I discuss some key ratios, fundamentals, some important resources to look at while deciding to buy a dividend stock. Also find out how to get free access to Morningstar, Value Line, workaround paywall behind popular news sites like Seeking Alpha etc.  Consider signing up for free instant access to the pdf version of the insights into dividend investing.