This was perhaps my strangest month of dividends in quite some time.  What happened?

Well, it was a mix of good and bad news.  While the dividends continued to roll in, three long-standing streaks of mine came to an end.  More on these later.

Dividend totals were fine, but Year-over-Year (YoY) dividend growth was bad.

Dividend raises came in, but they didn’t provide the additional forward dividend income boost I desired.

I purchased some shares to add to my Portfolio, but not as many as I sold, so it was effectively a net withdrawal.  It’s hard to grow the Portfolio like that!

While I noted a solid boost to my additional forward dividend income from Reinvested Dividends, the help from Dividend Raises was spartan, and that from Investment of Capital was non-existent.

Needless to say, it was an uphill climb in July.  However, it will all be a small hurdle in my path to financial freedom.

Let’s get some details on these Portfolio happenings I mention… starting with my dividend income in July.

 

Dividend Income

 

I cracked the $1K mark once again this month as I raked in $1,050.38 in dividends.  That’s thankfully one of my streaks that remains intact.

Unfortunately, YoY growth was negative, at –15.78%.  This resulted from July’s dividend total falling well short of the $1,247.20 that I collected in July of 2021.  That 2021 total was boosted by a stellar special dividend from T. Rowe Price Group (TROW) that wasn’t duplicated this year.

The negative YoY growth number ends the longest Portfolio streak I had.  Since the beginning of 2016, when I could first begin reporting YoY growth for my Portfolio income, I’ve managed to post positive YoY growth each and every month.  The streak reached 78 months and it survived one-time special dividends, dividend cuts and stock sales in the past.  However, that TROW special dividend from last year was so big that my normal growth couldn’t overcome its absence.  Oh well, let the next streak begin!

If I remove the TROW special dividend from the equation, YoY growth would have been 17.78%.  A much better number, no doubt… and it would have eclipsed the 15% target I have each month.

A total of 21 companies paid me a dividend in July.  Two of my dividend payers managed a triple-digit dividend, with one stock paying me $100+ for the first time.

Altria Group (MO) led my dividend payers by providing $116.55.  That was followed by a lovely $100.25 from RPM International (RPM).  I love seeing new triple-digit dividends.

My smallest dividend was $13.60 from Medtronic (MDT) – one of my Portfolio newcomers.  My dividend from Amdocs Ltd. (DOX) was a bit higher at $15.80.  If I get my wish, I’ll be able to pick up some additional MDT shares in the coming months, and come next quarter MDT won’t be posting my smallest dividend.

The increased dividend amounts from Merck & Co. (MRK) and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) were each helped by one or more additional purchases over the past year.

Increased YoY amounts for all other companies were a result of dividend increases and reinvested dividends over the past year.  I added over $12 in YoY dividend gains from MO, as well as over $6 each from RPM, Illinois Tool Works (ITW) and Automatic Data Processing (ADP).

There was one stock with a payout reduction compared to the same month a year ago.  That stock was Gentex (GNTX).  This was the result of my trimming of GNTX due to no dividend growth in over two years.

Where my Portfolio was strong this month was with new dividend payers.  My Portfolio welcomed an impressive 6 new dividend payers this July compared to the same time last year.  Omnicom Group (OMC) debuted with the largest dividend in this group, at $68.07.  Next in line were 3 different REITs: Medical Properties Trust (MPW) delivering $40.12, STORE Capital (STOR) providing $27.20 and VICI Properties sending $19.32.  These were followed by the aforementioned $15.80 and $13.60 from DOX and MDT, respectively.

Four stocks no longer paid a dividend for my Portfolio this July.  The biggest loss was the absence of the TROW special dividend that I noted before.  However, I also had to overcome no payments from W.P Carey (WPC), Air Lease (AL) and Iron Mountain (IRM), all of which were in the $36 to $41 range.  WPC left my Portfolio due to minimal dividend growth, AL was booted for dividend safety, and IRM exited due to high valuation and an absence of dividend growth that has yet to return.

As usual, all my dividends got automatically reinvested into the stocks that paid them.  The additional forward dividend income boost that resulted from the reinvestment was a solid $40.20.  This easily surpassed my monthly $30 target and was the first time exceeding $40 this year in a non-quarter-ending month.  MO provided the biggest forward dividend income boost from reinvested dividends, bringing over $10 by itself.  Six other stocks were able to boost my forward dividend income by at least $2.

As a result of July’s reinvested dividends, I purchased over 18 new shares of stock – which may be my largest monthly quantity ever.  This included over 2 shares of MO and MPW, and over 1 share each of RPM, OMC, Cisco Systems (CSCO), Comcast (CMCSA), OGE Energy (OGE), GNTX and STOR.  It was another terrific month of DRiPs.

 

Dividend Raises

July was light on dividend raises for my Portfolio.  I notched 3 raises in total, all bunched in the middle of the month.  I haven’t had more than 3 raises in a month since February.

Sadly, none of the raises were of the double-digit variety.  Yet, one of the three raises exceeded my expectations, one met them, and the final one sorely failed to met them.

The first raise of the month was my best in terms of the percentage increase and the resulting boost to my forward dividend income.  This raise came from Cummins (CMI) and it met my expectations with an upper single-digit raise of 8.28%.  Unfortunately, with CMI being one of my smaller positions right now, the forward dividend income boost from the raise was small.

The next raise was announced by Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA).  This one was so disappointing.  The 0.52% boost made last year’s 2.14% increase seem generous.  This led to my smallest forward dividend income boost from any raise this month, despite WBA being my largest position of the three.

The final raise of July came from National Retail Properties (NNN).  Frankly, the 3.77% raise was better than I was expecting… a nice surprise given the sub-2% boosts in each of the past 2 years.

I was thinking I might see a dividend raise announcement from Skyworks Solutions (SWKS) in July, too.  However, SWKS slipped this into August this year (which it’s done before), so I’ll save those details for next month.

 

 

Adding up the three dividend raises from July, my forward dividend income increased by $9.99.  This was by far my smallest monthly boost from raises thus far in 2022.  The previous low was the $33.45 from last month.

In addition, I haven’t seen less than $31 in a month from dividend raises in over 23 months, so the sub $10 number was a real downer.  Another streak bites the dust.  Last year at this time I had a boost of $32.37.

The forward dividend income number from raises would have looked better had SWKS managed to make their announcement in July as anticipated.

I’d have to invest $374.16 at my Portfolio’s yield of 2.67% in order to receive the same boost to my forward dividend income as this month’s raises.

Looking ahead to August, I expect to see more than 3 raises for the first time in 6 months.  As of this writing, I’ve already heard from Main Street Capital (MAIN), SWKS, and ITW as expected.  I’ll report on those next month.  However, I also expect to hear a raise announcement from VICI and MO.

 

Dividends Due To New Investment

Portfolio transactions were few and far between in July.  I made a total of 4 transactions involving only 3 stocks.

The 4 transactions were comprised of 3 purchases and 1 sale (a trim).

One of my moves was a single-share purchase of Microsoft (MSFT).  I try to add to MSFT when its valuation comes down, which isn’t often.

That was followed by another trim of GNTX, which I also had last month, too.  This freed up some capital to invest in stocks that are actually growing their dividend.

I used some of the sale proceeds to add to my Verizon (VZ) position… twice.  I was a little premature in my VZ adds, as the price declined further in the days that followed.

Unusual for me, I failed to reinvest most/all of the sale proceeds I had.  I was holding out for a lower price on MDT, but never got it.

Purchase details for all these transactions can be found in the following two posts…

 

Recent Buy – MSFT

Recent Transactions – GNTX & VZ

 

The 4 total transactions resulted in a net withdrawal of $1,014.95 due to me failing to reinvest all the proceeds from the GNTX trim.

My forward dividend income also decreased by $0.72 as a result.  Seeing a negative number here is a bit disheartening.  However, I’ll have extra capital to invest in the coming days/weeks with the remaining proceeds.  Thus, expect a rebound in this category.

Since I didn’t purchase any new Portfolio stocks, and my lone sale was just a trim, the number of stocks in my Portfolio remained at 58.

 

Tallying Up The Additional Forward Dividend Income

In 2022, 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 show 2021 totals as well, so that we can compare as the year progresses.  Ouch!  I see some red in my table below for the first time in a long time.

 

 

My additional forward dividend income came in at $49.47 for July.  Oh no, another streak has come to an end.  My 18-month streak of having at least $100 in additional forward dividend income is over.  Not only did I fail to reach $100, I didn’t even reach half of that number.

The numbers from Dividend Raises and Investment of Capital were my problems.  They were my worst of the year in each category.  They came in much lower than normal, and in the case of Investment of Capital, came in negative.  Not even a good month from Reinvested Dividends was enough to offset things.

 

Progress Charts

The following are progress charts, also available on my Dividends page.  My YoY growth streak is over after 78 months!  I’m sad to see it go.

 

 

 

On an annual basis, here’s what the dividend totals look like.  Here’s something positive to note this month.  It only took 7 months in 2022 to exceed my dividend total for all of 2018.  Oh yeah!

 

 

Summary

Dividends topped $1K in July, reaching $1,050.38.  YoY growth was a -15.78% as a result of the big TROW special dividend being part of last year’s total, but would have been +17.78% under normal circumstances.

Reinvested dividends provided over $40 of additional forward dividend income.  This was easily my strongest contributor to my additional forward dividend income in July.

I posted only 3 dividend raises in July (same as in June) with each raise being a single-digit one.  The raises fell just short of delivering $10 of additional forward dividend income.

I recorded 4 Portfolio transactions in July – 3 purchases and 1 trim involving 3 different stocks.  I trimmed GNTX once again, but added one share of MSFT and several of VZ.  I didn’t end up reinvesting all my trim proceeds, which resulted in a net withdrawal of almost $1,015 from my Portfolio for the month.  This also decreased my additional forward dividend income ever so slightly, by less than $1.

Tallying the contributions from all sources, I added only $49 in additional forward dividend income for my Portfolio in July.  This was my worst monthly showing in nearly 2 years.  Contributions from Dividend Raises and Investment of Capital were not up to snuff in July.

My Portfolio’s annual forward dividend income total finished the month at $15,353.90.  I’m still on track to reach $16K by year’s end.

 

What do you think of some of my Portfolio streaks coming to an end?  Please share in the Comments!

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