March 2019 Summary

I have to admit that I didn’t spend too much time blogging recently. Raising a baby and training for triathlon definitely takes its toll on time spent on reading other blogs and writing posts of my own. However, I don’t want to make excuses, as I could definitely find some time if I omitted unproductive activities in my life (playing mobile video games, browsing Facebook, etc.). Anyway, one thing I am sure of, is that I will keep doing my monthly summary reports, as this is the most enjoyable type of posts to write.

Without further ado, let’s see what my portfolio generated during the month of March.

Dividend Income

This month I received dividend from 5 companies:

Almost $30 received which is quite a lot for my portfolio, so I can’t complain! I can see two new payers, as I received first dividends from Blackrock and Target. I purchased them in December and January respectively.

As always, let’s see what part of expenses, related to the companies, the dividends could cover if I decided to spend them:

  • $6.81 from Pfizer would cover 87% of our healthcare related expenses for the last 3 months. We didn’t spend much and it feels good that we have free healthcare system, as we had a few visits for regular health checks and vaccination for our baby-daughter;
  • $8.16 from Target would cover 0.6% of what our family spent on food in the last 3 months. Food expenses are pretty high but we are eating quite healthy products, so I am not planning to change this too much;
  • $4.02 from Exxon Mobil would cover 2.7% of our car & transportation expenses for the last 3 months;
  • $2.53 from Realty Income would cover 0.4% of our monthly rent;
  • $8.41 from Blackrock would cover ~57% of our expenses in Banking category for the last 3 months.

There is long way to go for dividends to cover significant amount of our monthly expenses but performing this fun exercise gives me motivation to keep going.

Year-on-Year Comparison

Let’s compare dividend income to March of last year:

It looks like my recent investments are finally kicking in. I have 3 new payers compared to last year which is the biggest growth driver. Of course, I cannot forget XOM and O that also contributed to the growth by raising their dividend.

This is how my dividend income progress looks like since the beginning of 2016 when I started tracking it:

Purchases and Portfolio Contributions

This month I added €600 to my investments account. I used this amount and some previous savings to add a new stock to my portfolio. On the 7th of March I purchased 21 shares of CVS for $53/share for a total of $1120. You may read more about this purchase here. As a result, our Projected Annual Dividend Income increased by $35.70 (after taxes).

I haven’t added any funds to P2P lending platform this month.

Dividend Increases

I am happy to say that the streak of dividend increases continues. I received one dividend increase, albeit a small one:

As expected, the raise is very tiny but Realty Income tend to increase their dividend every quarter, so I will take that.

Changes in Projected Annual Dividend Income (PADI)

As I mentioned in previous posts, I have a goal to increase my PADI to $450 from US companies this year. This means that I should add additional $18/month in average if I want to achieve the target. To track the progress, I monitor PADI increase/decrease from two sources – dividend increases and capital contribution.

Let’s see how forward dividend income changed during March:

As you may see, it was a strong month and I am on target to reach the goal if I keep up the pace.

P2P Lending Income

This month I received €7.66 in interest from P2P lending. Nothing new in this front, as I haven’t added any additional funds to this platform in the last few months, just re-invested the interest.

My loans portfolio currently consists of 70 loans for a total value of €728.

Summary

In total (after converting to EUR) I received €34.29 from passive income. This brings total number for the year so far to €69.26. I am falling behind my target to receive €480 from passive income during 2019. Thankfully, the next couple of months should be more fruitful, so it will give me some breathing space. On the other hand, I have already received almost double of what I had at this point last year, so the progress is there.

All in all, it was a great month. I know that the quarter-ending months are great for most dividend investors. Did March treat you well? Are you sharing any of the dividend payers with me? As always, thanks for stopping by and I would love to read your comments!

27 thoughts on “March 2019 Summary

  1. Living life over blogging…that’s the way to do it! Your child will appreciate the time you make and I hope you do well in your upcoming triathlon.

    You had pretty big improvement over last year and love to hear investors updates with growing that dividend snowball. Keep up the good work.

    1. Thanks for visiting Ken K! It really feels good to see how the dividend snowball grows each month and it keeps me going.
      I can see that you are doing very nice on your journey and are already a long way in it! 🙂

  2. Hi BI. Nice going with the growth. I think you are ahead of me with forward dividenda. After divestments I made my should be around 400€/y

    1. Hi P2035,
      Thanks for the comment! I am not sure if I am ahead yet. Forward dividend income from US stocks currently stands at $320 and I have a few Baltics stocks. I think it is slightly less than €400 in total for now but I am getting there 🙂

      1. Will put back together goodle spreedsheet of my investment portfolio. Deleted it by mistake when cleaning my google drive 🙂 And then lets see 🙂

  3. Congrats on 300% YoY increase. The beauty of dividend investing is that we will get more passive income year after year even if we are busy with daily duty at the same time. Don’t feel anxious about not blogging.

  4. Those new payers provided a wonderful boost to your income, BI. You’ve picked up some nice momentum in growing your portfolio. Those purple bars on your chart look great, too.
    I share all but one stock with you this month, which is PFE. Love seeing your reports, keep them coming.

    1. Thanks a lot ED! I’m glad you like them. I have to thank you for the ideas how to represent dividend increases and changes to PADI 🙂
      Looking forward to see your report for March!

  5. $30 may not seem like much but in terms of growth it is a huge step forward from last year. Nice work! We share O and TGT this month. PFE has been on my watchlist as well so hope I can pick it up sometime when the price is right. Cheers!

    1. Thanks for the nice words Daze! I guess it depends on what you compare it with. Compared to my passive income last March, $30 looks huge. I hope I will be able to say the same next year as well 😀
      Glad to share those companies with you!

    1. Hi DP,
      Thanks for the nice words! I am behind my target to receive €480 form passive income this year but other financial goals seem to be on track for now 🙂

    1. Haha, thanks Lanny! It will be harder to repeat the growth rate, but I am going to follow your advice and attack it furiously! 🙂

    1. Thanks for the nice words Deluge! Haha, it’s always nice to find out some surprise dividend increases from your companies 🙂

  6. Slow and steady… Keep building that passive income stream. Clearly you are on the right path comparing 2018 to ’19. With every new payer you diversify more and spread and growth that income stream. Rest when you can too 🙂 I remember those baby days.

  7. Those are some awesome results BI. Almost 400% growth is friggin amazing! Also great to see that your dividend is coming from more sources compared to last year.

    Keep it up my friend and ALWAYS prioritize your life over blogging.

    1. Hey Div Stock Achiever,
      Thanks for stopping by! In May I have some Lithuanian companies paying their dividends (once a year), hence the spike 🙂 I will have one in April as well this year.

  8. Hey BI. Keep up the good work with the dividends and keep writing. Judging from the comments, you have a great following from the dividend investing community. Look for that next pullback to add some more funds. Tom

    1. Hey Tom, thanks for the comment! Yes, it is getting harder to find nice opportunities at the moment but those pullbacks will definitely come. We just need to be patient and take the opportunities when they arise 🙂

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