Monthly Review, April 2013

It has been a rather busy month for me. Early in April, I travelled to South Africa, spending precious time with family and friends. The least fun part of my short vacation was the return flight of 16 hours (non-stop!) from Johannesburg to Atlanta. I didn't realize that airplanes can fly so far, especially lifting off in Johannesburg at altitude! I don't sleep in airplanes, so that was a bit of an ordeal. Then there was tax day. Due to jet lag, I did just enough of my taxes to apply for an extension. So I'm still not done with my taxes… And, to top things off, back at work things have been crazy busy!

Given all of the above, I'm very happy with my DivGro activities in April. I wrote six posts, including my first quarterly review. Also, I transferred some funds into DivGro after one of my CD's reached maturity. This bonus deposit provided some welcome cash for more dividend growth stock buys. To that end, I evaluated Aflac Incorporated (AFL) and ConocoPhillips (COP), deciding to go with AFL because of its superior fair value discount.

COP remains interesting because it pays a dividend of $2.64 per share. This represents an attractive yield of about 4.4% (at the current price of $60). I think COP would be a good buy at $56, so for now I'll just wait.

My purchase of AFL increased DivGro's diversification into the Financial sector and added annual dividend income of $70 (or $52.50 for the 2013 calendar year).

At the end of April, my portfolio contained 6 stocks and had a market value of $28,692.11. This represents an overall gain of $1,692.11, or 6.27% since January. Of course, the PRR (personal rate of return) for DivGro is much higher (see my recent quarterly review of DivGro).

Transactions:

• 2013-04-02: Bonus APR Cash Deposit: $10,000
• 2013-04-16: BUY 50 AFL @ $50.06 ($70.00 Annual Income)
• 2013-04-30: MAY Cash Deposit: $1,000

New Dividends/Dividend Increases:

• The purchase of AFL increased expected dividend income for 2013 by $52.50
• In April, CVX increased its annual dividend by 11.1% to $4.00, adding $7.50 to expected dividend income for 2013; annual dividend income for CVX now is $100.00
• Total expected dividend income for 2013 is $781.09
• The forward 12-month projected dividend income is $820.69

Dividends Received:

• Total year-to-date: $138.88 of $781.09 (17.78%)

Markets:

Mar 31, 2013	DOW: 14,578.54 S&P 500: 1,569.19 10-YR BOND: 1.85%
Apr 30, 2013	DOW: 14,839.80 S&P 500: 1,597.57 10-YR BOND: 1.67%

Portfolio: Here is a spreadsheet showing DivGro's current holdings:
Yields: The following spreadsheet presents the current yield on cost for my stocks and the cumulative dividends received:
Looking Ahead: I'm still waiting for NTT's semi-annual dividend payment. Hopefully that will come through in May, along with some other dividend payments I'm expecting. I have enough cash available to buy at least three more stocks, perhaps even four if those dividend payments materialize. In May, I'll continue to evaluate a few of my watch list stocks in the hope of finding undervalued dividend growth stocks to buy.

If you have suggestions for candidate stocks to evaluate, feel free to share by posting a comment!