What a wild ride in February in the markets… especially that last week!  Thankfully, even though stock prices can wildly fluctuate, the dividend income doesn’t.  For the most part, it’s nice and predictable.  Even though I’m not relying on any of the dividend income yet for living expenses, it’s nice to know that steady stream of income is there.

This month I had another hefty total of dividends come my way, leading to some solid YoY growth.  In addition, I recorded another strong month of dividend raises… not quite as good as last month, but it still generated some outstanding additional forward dividend income.

I also continued to be active in terms of transactions within my Portfolio.  I’ve been initiating some change within my Portfolio, slowly, but consistently.  I can’t say there’s been a large investment of capital during the process, but more of a re-allocation of stocks, selling positions in certain sectors, while building positions in others.

As always, my Portfolio evolves over time.  My current changes are not quite done, but I like the direction I’m headed.

However, let’s stay focused on what we are here for…. Dividends!  Let’s examine my Portfolio dividends for the month of February…

 

Dividend Income

 

In February, I collected $786.77 in dividends.  This was a few dollars shy of last month’s total, but a strong total nonetheless.

YoY growth came in at 15.87% when compared to the $679.04 from February 2019.  This was a nice step up from the 10%+ YoY growth registered last month, and it met my unofficial monthly YoY growth target of 15%.

A total of 15 companies paid me a dividend this month.  This was one company less than the total from January.  It’s possible this could be the low mark for the year.  Having at least 15 dividend payers a month sounds good to me!

My largest dividend payment of the month came from Abbvie (ABBV), easily surpassing $100 and finishing at $135.14.  This total is growing nicely without much help from me.  Sure I’ve added some share here and there, but ABBV’s big yield leads to some substantial reinvested dividends, and of course ABBV’s dividend growth has been amazing.

I’m hoping it will be next quarter when ABBV has some company as a triple-digit payer, as Procter & Gamble (which delivered $95.52 this month) should hopefully attain that level after its expected dividend raise in April.

My smallest February dividend payment was delivered by Caterpillar (CAT), at $20.75.  CAT will more than likely not be bringing up the rear next quarter, as my late January share addition will kick in and result in a larger dividend payment.

The increased dividend amounts from ABBV and Starbucks (SBUX) were helped by an additional purchase over the past year.  Increased amounts for the other companies were a result of dividend increases and reinvested dividends over the past year.  The higher amounts from Fastenal (FAST), Nexstar Media Group (NXST) and Lowe’s Companies (LOW) stand out.

I did have one dividend payout reduction this month from Realty Income (O), and it was due to a partial sale in January.

Two new dividend payers arrived on the scene compared to last year, General Dynamics (GD) and CAT.  Both of these positions are ones I’m looking to grow.

I also had two stocks no longer paid me a dividend this February, Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH) and D.R. Horton (DHI).  DHI was sold last August as a result of a covered call option assignment, while CTSH was sold last November due to underwhelming performance and what appeared to be a change of direction in the business.

As usual, I reinvested all dividends into the stocks that paid them, resulting in an additional forward dividend income boost of $24.88.  With the slide in stock prices recently, my reinvested dividends will begin delivering a stronger addition to my forward dividend income, as more shares will be bought.

As a result of the reinvested dividends in February, I’m now the owner of just over 10.2 new shares of stock.  I added over 2.2 shares from reinvesting the FAST dividend alone.

 

Dividend Raises

February dividend raises were expected to be plentiful, and they did not disappoint.  It was an impressive follow-up to my stellar January raises, even though they didn’t quite measure up.

In February, I had 6 companies announce a dividend raise.  That’s one less than last month, but still a number I’d be happy to accept in any month.

Of the 6 raises, I’d say 1 was outstanding, 2 were satisfying, and 3 were disappointing.  However, the overall impact was awesome.

I started off the month with 3 raises in the same day.

One of those raises was a satisfying one, and it came from Gilead Science (GILD), which raised their dividend nearly 8%. While this is a growth slowdown compared to previous years, the amount is a good one.  Since GILD has one of my larger dividend weights in my Portfolio, this raise led to a $27.39 boost to my forward dividend income.

The other two raises that day were on the disappointing side.  I received a 3.70% raise from Aflac (AFL) and an even more disappointing 2.07% raise from 3M Co. (MMM).  I’ll certainly take the raises, but I was hoping for better numbers.  That’s two years in a row that AFL has failed to reach my expected 5-6% boost range.  The percentage increase from MMM hasn’t been that low since the Financial Crisis over a decade ago.  Hopefully, these are temporary adjustments and the companies will get back to better numbers moving forward.

A little over a week later, I received two more raise announcements on the same day.  One was exceptionally strong, while the other quite lackluster.

Let’s start with the positive.  T. Rowe Price Group (TROW) announced an incredible 18.42% raise.  With TROW having a large dividend weight in my Portfolio, the raise meant a massive $64.00 increase to my forward dividend income.  Hello!

The lackluster raise came from Cisco Systems (CSCO).  I understand the company is not firing on all cylinders right now, and some reduction is in order.  However, a 2.86% raise was well below my expectations.

Lastly, I finished off February raises with a very satisfying 7.07% raise from Pepsico (PEP).  This was a nice bounce back from last year’s sub 3% raise.  Again, with PEP holding a larger dividend weight within my Portfolio, the 7% raise led to a beautiful $28.71 bump in my forward dividend income.

 

 

All totaled, these dividend raises contributed a welcome $137.85 to my additional forward dividend income.

I’d have to invest $4,688.78 at my Portfolio’s current average yield of 2.94% in order to equal the same boost to my annual forward dividend income that these dividend raises provided.

That’s back-to-back months reaching a triple-digit increase in forward dividend income from raises.  Sweet!  In just the two months to begin 2020, I’ve recorded a boost of just over $300 in forward dividend income solely from raises.  Wow!

I project the dividend raises to cool off substantially in March.  I expect to hear annual raise announcements from GD and Gentex (GNTX), as well as some smaller quarterly raise announcements from O and W.P. Carey (WPC).

 

Dividends Due To New Investment

Unlike in January, this month I actually made a net investment in my Portfolio.  However, I didn’t generate as much forward dividend income.  Strange, right?

In February, I was still active with regard to transactions.  All totaled, I made 9 transactions… 4 sales involving 3 different companies, and 5 buys involving only 2 companies.

My transactions resulted in some re-shaping of my Portfolio.  I pared back my REIT sector allocation (for the most part) and rotated into the Information Technology sector.

You can find out what was bought and sold (in plenty of detail) in the following pair of posts.

Recent Transactions – CCI & AVGO

Recent Transactions – CCI, O, AVGO, GILD, ADP

When the month was over, I made a net investment of $1,403.95, some of which was leftover cash from some sales in January.  With the investment, I was able to book $34.35 in additional forward dividend income, meaning an average yield of 2.45%.

 

Tallying Up The Additional Forward Dividend Income

In 2020, I continue tracking my additional forward dividend income generated each month from the trifecta of sources: reinvested dividends, dividend raises, and new capital investment.

I’ll be showing 2019’s totals, too, so that we can compare as the year progresses.

Here’s how I’m thinking 2020 will shake out…  An increase in the ‘Reinvested Dividends’ category should be no problem given that I anticipate reinvesting all my dividends into the stocks that paid them.  After a strong start to the year, I’m optimistic that I will receive better ‘Dividend Raises’ than last year (yet still not as good as in 2018).  I’m also optimistic that I can surpass last year’s total in the ‘Investment of Capital’ category.  I still have about 90% of my projected 2020 investment capital to put to work over the course of the year to help in this regard.

 

 

The additional forward dividend income generated in February was $197.08… I couldn’t quite reach $200.  The most impressive part for me is that $300.66 total from Dividend Raises for the year so far.  Once I get the results from March, I might be about half way to last year’s total, with only one quarter of the year gone by.  Looking good!

For the 2nd straight month, I showed improvements from all 3 dividend income sources… very nice to see.

Despite having most of my projected investment capital left to deploy over the course of the year, I would suspect that ‘Dividend Raises’ will have the best total by year’s end – the 3rd year in a row.  That organic growth is the best!

 

Progress Charts

The following are progress charts, also available on my Dividends page.  Almost another $800 in dividend income in February!  My YoY growth streak continues… 61 months and counting.

 

 

On an annual basis, here’s what the dividend totals look like.  It’s been a good start to 2020.  I anticipate I’ll eclipse my entire 2015 total after collecting dividends for just 3 months in 2020.

 

Summary

Good progress again in February.  I collected over $786 in dividends from 15 different dividend payers, resulting in almost 15.9% YoY growth.

I recorded almost $25 of new forward dividend income from my dividend reinvestments in February.

Frequent dividend raises continued, as I notched 6 more in February.  Raises alone led to almost $138 of new forward dividend income, with close to half of that total coming from the TROW raise.

I had 9 transactions in February, 4 sales and 5 purchases.  It was a net investment of a little over $1,400, resulting in over $34 of new forward dividend income.

Counting all 3 income sources, I saw my total additional forward dividend income increase by $197.  And for the 2nd month in a row, all 3 of my income sources contributed significantly, with each showing YoY growth.

2020 is off to a terrific start.  Here’s to keeping that momentum throughout the year.

 

Are you happy with your dividend totals to start the new year?  Are you buying during the market downturn in an effort to boost future dividend income?  Please share in the Comments!

I have updated the Portfolio & Dividends pages in conjunction with this monthly update.