April 2014 Dividend Income, May Purchases, Dividend Raises and an Update Oh My!

May has been one of the craziest and busiest months of my life.  Not only have I been working long days (up to 14 hours/7 days a week) I have also closed on a house and moved in my spare time.  The end of May marks a brief reprieve from the long hours at work.  In the mean time I have missed out on many updates for you!.


April 2014 Dividend Income

The month of April marks my fourth month of investing in income and dividend growth stocks.  April was my largest harvest yet and I totaled $66.55 of income compared to $14.97 from January.  Compared to my spending of $1868.00 for April this dividend covers 3.56% of my total costs.

May Stock Purchases     

Thanks to the healthy dose of overtime I was able to make many purchases in the month of May.  May marks another month of investing in beleaguered income investments.  While I would normally choose to place my money in stable dividend growth champions and aristocrats I could not ignore the prices of some of my favorite income stocks.  I have been rewarded with capital appreciation of ~15%  from my purchase of SDRL last month and hoped to continued the trend.  

I purchased 200 shares of PSEC at a price of $10.55 per share.  This increases my yearly forward dividend income by $264.96.  PSEC currently boasts a $0.1104 per month dividend.

I purchased 31 shares of GLPI at a price of $34.28 per share.  This increases my yearly forward dividend income by $64.48.  GLPI currently boasts a $0.52 per quarter dividend.

I purchased 112 shares of AWLCF at a price of $22.24 per share.  This increases my yearly forward dividend income by $515.20.  AWLCF currently pays a dividend of $1.15 quarterly.

This is a total increase of $844.64.  

The shares of PSEC were bought in two transactions.  The first occurring the day before a 5% drop in share prices due to the announcement by the SEC.  Shares are now down significantly to the $10.00 range.  While I still like the company there are some important factors that need to be addressed before I will purchase more.  I am currently less worried about the SEC investigation and squeeze on the BDC market overall from de-listing from major indices than I am about PSEC's ability to continue dividend coverage.

GLPI marks my first REIT purchase and exposes me to both the REIT and gaming industries.

AWLCF is my favorite offshore drilling play on the market at this time.  The company pays the vast majority of its income from its two rigs out as dividends.  This is quite possibly the most risky and intriguing play in my portfolio.  The dividend is currently sitting over 20% and would absolutely be unsustainable if anything disastrous were to happen to either of the rigs.  Currently both of the rigs are contracted out and receiving increased dayrates in the near future.  I am under the opinion that AWLCF greatly benefits in the current tight offshore drilling market by having only two rigs, making it easier to secure contracts and maintain efficiency.

May Dividend Increases 

Two positions in my portfolio increased dividends in May.

SDRL increased it's dividend from $0.98 to $1.00  this increase of ~2% marks the fifth quarterly increase in a row for the company.  Shares of SDRL have also rebounded greatly in the last month and a half.

AWLCF increased its dividend from $1.10 to $1.15.  This marks the third time that AWLCF has raised its income in the last year and is an increase of ~4.5%.

With these new purchases and dividend increases my current yearly forward dividend income is now $1799.37.

When I get access to internet on my personal PC again updates should return to the normal rate and I will update my portfolio page.  Hopefully you all had a fantastic May!

My current watch list for June purchases:  NAT, GM, VZ, RIG

Disclosure:  Long AWLCF, GLPI, PSEC

Chevron Gave me a Raise!

I would like to take a moment to thank Chevron Corp.  (CVX) for giving me a 7% raise this year.  Chevron has increased their dividends from $1.00 per share up to $1.07 per share.  This is one of those warm fuzzy moments that occur multiple times a year when you invest in strong dividend growth stocks.

I personally own 9 shares of Chevron so this raise will net me an extra $2.52 per year.  It doesn't seem like much but these raises add up tremendously year after year.  I plan on putting this money to good use in my future purchases.  So thank you Chevron for the extra cash, I will buy half a Subway sandwich in your honor.  My yearly dividends going forward have increased to $942.29

Dividend Increase, Coke Bubbling Up More Dividends

Coca Cola (KO) has recently announced that they will be increasing their dividend from $0.28 to $0.305 per share.  This constitutes an increase of 8.9% from their previous payout.  I don't know about you, but getting an 8.9% raise in a year for doing absolutely nothing seems pretty nice to me!  This is the power of dividend growth investing in action.

I personally have 26 shares of coke in my portfolio.  Today's action increases my yearly dividend payout from $440.61 to $443.21 per year.  A total increase of  $2.60.  While this may not seem like much, every single penny counts, and this snowflake just became integrated into my little snowball forever.  I have updated my portfolio to reflect this change.