I’m back again to detail some more August transactions within my dividend Portfolio.  It’s been busier than normal for me with regard to Portfolio moves this month.

This time around I’ve got two sales and four buys to go over.

I primarily used one of the sales (a significant trim) to fund all the purchases.  The other sale was made to purge a small position from my Portfolio.

Similar to my last transactions, I did more shuffling of positions as opposed to investing new cash.  However, once again I boosted my forward dividend income with all the transactions thanks to the stocks I purchased having a higher yield than those which I sold.

All the transaction details follow.  I’ll try to be brief since I have a handful of stocks to cover!

 

Air Lease (AL)

As I mentioned in my last post, AL was still a sizeable position in my Portfolio even after last week’s trim.

The safety of the AL dividend was the main factor in the trim, but the paring back of AL in my Portfolio was something I’d already started early in 2021 due to average performance for this relatively low-yielding company.

With this sale, I made a hefty dent in my AL position, nearly cutting it in half.

On 8/25/21, I sold 100 shares of AL at $41.40/sh.  This was 45% of my position.  After the SEC fee, the sale proceeds were $4,139.98.

At my sale price, shares of AL yielded 1.55%, which is 0.71% lower than my current average Portfolio yield of 2.26%.

I trimmed my most expensive AL share lot.  They were from 5/12/2016 which I’d purchased at $29.665/share.

The sale resulted in a long-term capital gain of $1,171.48, as well as a $64.00 reduction in annual forward dividend income.

I still have a decent AL position of 122.424 shares.  The position feels more right-sized given its current dividend safety.  AL is now 0.8% of my Portfolio value, and 0.6% of my dividend income.  However, there’s a possibility I continue to trim, or even exit the position, given that I’m also looking to reduce my weighting in the Industrials sector.

AL now ranks as my 42nd largest position (a big fall from 29th).  It’s behind Hormel Foods (HRL), but ahead of Lockheed Martin (LMT).

 

So what stocks did I buy with the AL sale proceeds?  I bought shares in several of my smallest Portfolio positions, making those stocks a more significant part of my Portfolio…

 

Omnicom Group (OMC)

I started my purchases by continuing to build out my newest position.

This was my 2nd OMC buy in a week, after establishing the position early in August.

This addition was an identical share-size purchase compared to the other two, with the purchase price falling in between the ones obtained in the previous two.

On 8/25/21, I purchased 15 shares of OMC @ $72.7479/sh., for a total of $1,091.22.  The stock yielded 3.85% at the time of my purchase (or 1.59% above my current Portfolio average).

My overall cost basis rose about a quarter to $72.25/share.  The purchase resulted in the addition of $42.00 in annual forward dividend income.

I now own 45 shares of OMC.  Its position is still small, but it’s growing quickly.  It moves up to the 48th largest position in my Portfolio (out of 54 stocks), now ahead Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY), but behind Microsoft (MSFT).

OMC continues to be on my radar despite the recent purchases, as the position has more room to grow.

 

Lockheed Martin (LMT)

I couldn’t pass on adding another LMT share at this time.  The stock had dropped about 2.5% from the level of my 1-share purchase last month.

If I liked it then, I must like it even more at a lower price, right?  That is indeed the case.

On 8/25/21, I purchased 1 share of LMT @ $358.38.  The stock yielded 2.90% at the time of my purchase (or 0.64% above my current Portfolio average).

My overall cost basis climbed a bit to $343.54/share.  The purchase resulted in the addition of $10.40 in annual forward dividend income.

My LMT position has now grown to 13.155 shares.  Given the small number of shares, it would seem the position is small, but with LMT’s big share price this position became the 43rd largest position in my Portfolio.  LMT trails my newly trimmed AL position, but has surpassed the value of my Walt Disney Co. (DIS) position.

I’m prepared to make LMT an even bigger part of my Portfolio moving forward.

 

Amgen (AMGN)

As AMGN has tumbled from the $250/sh. level over the course of the past month, I’ve become more interested in building my position.

I bought a single share earlier this month just below $229.  With the decline into the low $220s, I felt the desire to add more.

Shares are almost as cheap as when I established my AMGN position last November.

On 8/25/21, I purchased 3 shares of AMGN @ $221.95, for a total of $665.85.  The stock yielded 3.17% at the time of my purchase (or 0.91% above my current Portfolio average).

My overall cost basis dropped some to $224.79/share.  The purchase resulted in the addition of $21.12 in annual forward dividend income.

My AMGN position has crept up to 16.088 shares… about a 23% boost thanks to this purchase.

AMGN has become my 46th largest position, close behind OGE Energy (OGE), but comfortably ahead of MSFT.

Adding more AMGN shares remains in my mind, especially in this $220-$225 range.

 

Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY)

Staying in the Healthcare sector, my last purchase was shares of BMY.  It also happened to be my biggest purchase of the group.

I initiated my BMY position just two months ago.  I bought 17 shares at that time, but came close to tripling my position after adding shares here.

The price of BMY has ticked higher in the past two months, but not so significantly that it changed my view of the undervalued nature of the shares.

On 8/26/21, I purchased 30 shares of BMY @ $67.15, for a total of $2,014.50.  The stock yielded 2.92% at the time of my purchase (or 0.66% above my current Portfolio average).

My overall cost basis rose nearly a dollar to $66.49/share.  The purchase resulted in the addition of $58.80 in annual forward dividend income.

My BMY position has jumped higher to 47.122 shares.  This allowed BMY to leap several positions in my Portfolio ranks.

BMY is now the 49th largest position (or 6th smallest depending on how you look at it).  It’s sandwiched in between OMC and W.P. Carey (WPC).

I’ll be looking to add more BMY shares if the price can hover in the current $65.00-$67.50 price range, as despite this addition, it remains one of my smallest positions and it needs to be bigger to provide a meaningful contribution to my Portfolio.

 

Organon & Co. (OGN)

OGN was a recent spinoff from Merck & Co. (MRK) this past June.  I received 10 shares at the time, and it became the 10th Healthcare stock in my Portfolio.

I didn’t necessarily have any plans to keep the shares long-term, as I had several other small positions in the sector that I wished to grow instead (namely AMGN and BMY, as we just covered).

At the time of the spinoff, OGN wasn’t paying a dividend, but they initiated one a couple of weeks ago.  The yield is healthy at over 3%.  However, that wasn’t enough to sway me from selling my shares and exiting the position.

On 8/26/21, I sold all 10 shares of OGN at $33.70/sh.  After the SEC fee, the sale proceeds were $336.99.

At my sale price, shares of OGN yielded 3.32%, which is 1.06% higher than my current average Portfolio yield.

The sale resulted in a short-term capital loss of $32.04, as well as an $11.20 reduction in annual forward dividend income.

I did manage to hold the shares a few days past the stock’s first ex-dividend date, so I’ll be collecting my one and only OGN dividend next month.

The number of stocks in my Portfolio dropped to 54 once I exited my OGN position.

I haven’t really reallocated the funds from this sale to anything yet.  However, expect that I’ll find a new investment home for those dollars in the coming weeks.

 

Summary

I made several Portfolio transactions in the last couple of days.  I significantly trimmed one position and redirected the proceeds to build out a handful of smaller Portfolio positions.  I also eliminated a position after selling some spinoff shares.

I once again trimmed my AL position in an effort to continue improving the dividend safety of my Portfolio.

That was followed up by purchases of OMC, LMT, AMGN & BMY in an effort to not only bolster those small positions, but to add more forward dividend income than I lost with the AL trim.

Lastly I eliminated my OGN position (spinoff from MRK), as it was by far my smallest position and I didn’t have any desire to build it out.

The 6 transactions resulted in a net withdrawal of $347.02 from my Portfolio.  However, as a result of investing most of my sale proceeds into higher-yielding stocks, I was able to increase my annual forward dividend income by $57.12.

As a result of the two sales, I recorded a long-term capital gain of $1,171.48 and a short-term capital loss of $32.04.

The number of stocks in my Portfolio dropped to 54 with the elimination of my OGN position.

 

Do you have any smaller investments in your portfolio that you want to see become larger?  Or would you rather eliminate the position and redirect the funds?  I look forward to your comments!