These are my buys for April + May 2019

So its a double whammy buy post for your reading pleasure!

I made one regular buy in April, I added a Dividend Aristocrat to my portfolio who has been on quite some radars of fellow DGI bloggers:

On the 15th of April I initiated a position with 14 shares @ $53,89.

In The Netherlands, April is the month where your employer pays your “Holiday allowance”. In my case I discussed with my wife if we should add some more fuel to our FIRE and she said yes! So that means that I could double my buying power in May (and actually I also already used my budget for June since I was on a buying a spree).

On the 8th of May I Initiated a position in another well known company, 3M. I bought 4 shares @ $179,90.

I really went on a buying spree on the 23d of May since I bought three different shares including one new  one!

I bought and expanded my position with 14 shares Legget & Platt (LEG) @ $36,97.

I bought and expanded my position with 10 shares Iron Mountain (IRM) @ $31,76.

And last but not least I opened up one new position with 10 shares of CVS @ $52,75.

BAM! There you have it, I wielded some nice capital to buy (what I  believe to be) some mighty fine investments which will provide me and my family with increasing income for many years to come (well except CVS for a while).

My new forward income is now €822,27 post-tax. Dang people, the infamous €1000 mark is in my sights!

 

 

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April 2019 dividend report

Another full month has passed and all I have to show you guys is my April dividend report. Life continues to thwart my plans (I let it though :)) with regard to more regular updates on this page. Juggling a family with two small kids and a high performance job takes a lot of energy which leaves less for this blog.

That doesn’t mean that I have been sitting on  the sidelines regarding dividends and new buys! I’ll leave the buys for my next post (I’ll combine my April and May buys) and as a teaser for that I will say that I made five buys, three of which were new positions!

Here are my results for April, no less then 10 companies payed me a dividend, including the annual from AD.

Ticker	Amount (€)
PPL	7.19
IRM	17.6
KMB	3.89
PEP	3.50
AD	10.79
HASI	3.79
LEG	4.58
CAH	5.01
O	3.90
CSCO	2.65
	€62.90

Here are the visuals:

Working towards my goal of €650,- in received dividends this year:

Still on target after 4 months into the year.

Total dividend 2019: €240,28
Total dividend received ever: €674,32

And now….the big moment, my YoY-comparison!

April 2018: €20,70
April  2019: €62,90

Thats another awesome increase of 303,86% compared to last year! As always my results are converted from their base currency to euro and are post-tax.

I’ll be off binge-commenting on your blogs now, I would love to hear your thoughts on your month (or mine)?

 

March 2019 dividend report

Another month has passed in a flash, amazing to see how fast time goes by. Ofcourse having an extremely busy month helps too 🙂 Between juggling a family with two kids, a trip to CloudFest in Germany and stress at work it is calming to see my money working for me in the stock market.

I (well technically my advisor) completed my taxes last week and its great to see an extra amount heading our way (we always pay the full amount on our mortgage so we get back once a year). So part of that money will most likely be used to invest some extra money in the stock market and / or paying off our mortgage.

On to the results for March:

No less then 11 companies payed me this month and (spoiler alert!) it has been another record breaking month!

Ticker	Amount (€)
INTC	1.88
PFE	7.26
UN	13.29
IBM	5.93
ADM	10.53
PRU	3
ORI	10.04
O	3.89
ED	4.44
VFC	2.29
QCOM	8.9
	€71.45

Un-freaking-believable! Not only did I break my previous record of €54,68; I totally skipped the €60 range and went straight into €70 territory!

Here are the visuals:

Working towards my goal of €650,- in received dividends this year:

So a quarter in the year and over a quarter of the way towards my end goal. Not too shabby if I may say so myself. 🙂

Total dividend 2019: €177,38
Total dividend received ever: €611,42

And now….the big moment, my YoY-comparison!

March 2018: €17,66
March 2019: €71,45

Thats another awesome increase of 404,86% compared to last year! As always my results are converted from their base currency to euro and are post-tax.

I’ll be off binge-commenting on your blogs now, I would love to hear your thoughts on your month (or mine)?

 

These are my buys for February and March

Yes! I still managed to squeeze this post in March. It has been extremely busy on my end, both personal and professional. Juggling a four year old with a five month old baby requires a lot of energy. Energy which is somewhat in less supply due to a high performance job and sleep deprivation due to previously mentioned family members. 🙂

I just got back from 4 days at a Cloud Conference in Germany,  interesting but also draining and I’m glad to be home again to spend some extra quality time.

Thankfully my money is working for me 24/7 without any energy from me except watching my portfolio and making the right buys. I didn’t post about my buy last month so this post is a combination of both the previous and the current month.

On the 11th of February I expanded my position in ADM with 22 shares @ $41,97.

On the 28th of February (technically almost March) I expanded another position by adding 13 shares of Qualcomm @ $52,90.

With the change I had left I bought 1 more share of AT & T @ $31.

So there you have it, I did not initiate a new position but rather expanded existing ones. I’m pretty happy with my buys but excited about your opinion as well. Care to comment?

January 2019 dividend report

The new year started of with a bang and the first month has flown by. As you may have read in my previous post, I started the year with a nice deployment of capital. Initiating positions in the financial sector I added some more balance to my portfolio. Next to spending money, I also received money in the form of sweet dividends.

No less then 10 companies paid me in the past month, including newcomer Legget & Platt (LEG).

Ticker	Amount (€)
PPL	7.03
IRM	17.32
KMB	3.73
PEP	3.44
DIS	1.3
HASI	3.66
LEG	4.52
CAH	4.96
O	3.79
CSCO	2.46
	€52,21

Ladies and gentlemen, I broke the €50 mark for the first time! That is so friggin’ awesome! Bonuspoints for you if you know from which movie the following screenshot is from:

My dividend visuals look more and more appealing:

And I’m actively working towards my new dividend goal for 2019 (€650):

Total dividend 2019: €52,21
Total dividend received ever: €485,29

And now….the big moment, my YoY-comparison!

January 2018: €8,92
January 2019: €52,21

Thats another amazing increase of 585,31% compared to last year! As always my results are converted from their base currency to euro and are post-tax.

I’ll be off binge-commenting on your blogs now, I would love to hear your thoughts on your month (or mine)?

These are my buys for January 2019

So it’s already February! Last month went by so fast, its not even funny. This could be the sleep deprivation talking (a young baby will do that to you) but an entire month went by in the blink of an eye.

January was an interesting month as I had additional capital to spend due to a raise and a bonus from work. Both have been fully deployed into my stock portfolio.

As I have mentioned a few times on my blog (and on your blogs too) I lack(ed) exposure to the financial sector. So I decided to remedy that situation with the following purchases.

On 2/1/2019 I purchased 4 shares Prudential Financial @ $82,75.

On 2/1/2019 I purchased 20 shares Old Republic International @ $20,02.

On 22/1/2019 I purchased 30 shares Old Republic International @ $20,75.

On 24/1/2019 I purchased 17 shares Old Republic International @ $20,02.

And to top it all of, a non-financial buy to expand my existing position in this consumer staples giant:

And to top it all off I also purchased 14 shares of Unilever @ €45,73

It is a lot of fun when I’m able to deploy this much capital, I wish I could to this every month! 🙂 I’m really happy with expanding my portfolio with two new companies in a new  sector together with bolstering my Unilever position.

This brings my new forward annual income to a total of €654,-

How amazing is that?!?

2018 review + Goals 2019

Sooooo here is my post about my goals for 2019. But to understand the goals of 2019 we first need to look at my goals of 2018:

My goals for 2018:

1. Receive €200,- in dividends: My total endscore is no less then €345,25. Its safe to say that I really crushed this one 🙂 Succes!
2. Increase dividend portfolio to €10.000: After a constructive discussion with my wife we decided to up my monthly contribution to €500. We ended the year including capital gains around €16.500,- Succes!
3. Increase forward income to $450: With my increased capital deployment (including extra birthday buys, tax recoup buys, etc) I was able to make huge progress in this department. Currently my forward income sits at €592,- (post tax and in EUROS!) Succes!
4. Write a blog post once a week: I posted a total of 31 messages, especially since my second child was born, free time dropped significantly. Fail!
5. Spend less time with my phone: I started of the year great with a very nice focus, gradually during the year I started slipping back into old habits. So’m giving myself a fail for this one. Fail!
6. Spend more time with my family: Even though I failed the previous goal I really focused more on family time this year. Multiple visits to our families out house and family-in-law. Succes!
7. Read 12 self-improvement books: I really did my best on this one, I read the following books (if you’re interested in one, drop me a mail and I’ll gladly give you my view on it.
   1. Simon Sinek – Start with Why
   2. Simon Sinek – Leaders eat last
   3. Seth Godin – Tribes
   4. L. David Marquet – Turn the ship around
   5. The Idea-Driven Organization
   6. I’m pretty sure I read a few others but can’t remember them at this time.
8. Exercise 2-3 times a week: All the way up to the birth of my second daughter everything went fine. After that…not so much. Still all things considered it still a pass. Succes!

All in all I think I had a pretty good year!

And now for my new and improved goals for this year.

My new goals for 2019:

1. Receive €550 650,- in dividends: Self-explanatory, I need to step up my game with quality buys to attain this goal. In the previous year my total amount was €345,25,-
2. Increase dividend portfolio to €28.500: Current portfolio worth is about 18k so that means I need to add at least €10.000 of fresh capital. With my new pay upgrade thanks to working my ass of at the office  I’m upping my monthly contribution to €600. Which means I need to find another €3300 of additional capital. Ofcourse I’m reinvesting all my dividends so its actually somewhat less.
3. Increase forward income to €1000: My current forward income stands at €604. This means I have go invest at least €10.000 at 4% yield. Let’s hope for some major dividend increases to help me out here.
4. Write a healthy amout of 40 blogposts: Less the the previous year, my life is just way to busy at the moment.
5. Spend less time with my phone: Aiming for a 30 minutes max per day.
6. Spend more time with my family: My family matters, in fact they are the main reason why I do what I do and work hard towards financial independence.
7. Read 12 self-improvement books: I need to constantly work on myself to improve myself. This means reading a lot (next to relaxing lecture) about ways to improve myself either personally or professionally.
8. Exercise 2-3 times a week: Next to keeping my mind sharp I need to keep my body healthy as well. Regular exercise, eating healthy and getting enough sleep are all part of this goal.

So here we are, my third set of goals since starting this blog. I really believe in the power of goal setting, so this will be my guide for the coming year.