Monthly Review Of DivGro: September 2019

Welcome to the September review of DivGro, my portfolio of dividend growth stocks. The goal of these monthly reviews is to share updates I've made to the portfolio and to provide a summary of dividends collected. Additionally, I look at how the month's activities have impacted DivGro's projected annual dividend income (PADI).

In September, I added shares to one existing position. Eight DivGro stocks announced dividend increases in September. The net result of these changes is that PADI increased by about 0.8% in September. Year over year, PADI increased by 19.5%.

As for dividend income, in September I received dividends totaling $3,355 from 46 stocks in my portfolio, a year over year increase of 24%. So far in 2019, I've collected $19,594 in dividends or about 78% of my 2019 goal of $25,200.


Assuming the status quo and given DivGro's PADI of $25,789, I can expect to receive $2,149 in dividend income per month, on average, in perpetuity. Of course, most of the stocks I own are dividend growers, so I expect my dividend income to increase over time! Furthermore, I plan to reinvest dividends until I retire, so DivGro's PADI should continue to grow through dividend growth and through compounding.

Dividend Income

In September, I received a total of $3,355 in dividend income from 46 different stocks:
Following is a list of the dividends I collected in September:

• Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) — income of $70.00
• Aflac (AFL) — income of $27.00
• Amgen (AMGN) — income of $87.00
• Anthem (ANTM) — income of $8.00
• Boeing (BA) — income of $61.65
• Blackrock (BLK) — income of $115.50
• Cummins (CMI) — income of $65.55
• Canadian National Railway (CNI) — income of $10.16
• Costco Wholesale (COST) — income of $6.50
• Chevron (CVX) — income of $95.20
• Dominion Energy (D) — income of $91.75
• Digital Realty Trust (DLR) — income of $48.60
• Ford Motor (F) — income of $300.00
• Gilead Sciences (GILD) — income of $126.00
• Home Depot (HD) — income of $81.60
• Honeywell International (HON) — income of $49.20
• International Business Machines (IBM) — income of $48.60
• Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) — income of $6.88
• Intel (INTC) — income of $157.50
• Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) — income of $117.80
• Lockheed Martin (LMT) — income of $30.80
• Main Street Capital (MAIN) — income of $51.25
• McDonald's (MCD) — income of $31.32
• 3M (MMM) — income of $86.40
• Microsoft (MSFT) — income of $46.00
• NextEra Energy (NEE) — income of $31.25
• NIE-name (NIE) — income of $380.00
• Realty Income (O) — income of $11.33
• PepsiCo (PEP) — income of $19.10
• Pfizer (PFE) — income of $72.00
• Public Storage (PSA) — income of $60.00
• Qualcomm (QCOM) — income of $21.70
• Ross Stores (ROST) — income of $25.50
• Snap-On (SNA) — income of $23.75
• Stanley Black & Decker (SWK) — income of $34.50
• TJX (TJX) — income of $46.00
• T Rowe Price (TROW) — income of $152.00
• Travelers (TRV) — income of $82.00
• Unitedhealth (UNH) — income of $43.20
• Union Pacific (UNP) — income of $38.80
• United Parcel Service (UPS) — income of $48.00
• Visa (V) — income of $4.25
• Valero Energy (VLO) — income of $166.50
• Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) — income of $137.25
• Wells Fargo (WFC) — income of $51.00
• Exxon Mobil (XOM) — income of $87.00

The following chart shows DivGro's monthly dividends plotted against PMDI. Quarter-ending months are huge outliers:
For this reason, I now create a rolling 12-month average of dividends received (the orange bars) plotted against a rolling 12-month average of PMDI (the blue, staggered line):
While it would be nicer if dividends were distributed more evenly, it is not something that would drive my investment decisions.

Dividend Changes

In September, the following stocks announced dividend increases:

• Canadian National Railway (CNI) — increase of 0.35%
• Honeywell International (HON) — increase of 9.76%
• Lockheed Martin (LMT) — increase of 9.09%
• McDonald's (MCD) — increase of 7.76%
• Microsoft (MSFT) — increase of 10.87%
• Realty Income (O) — increase of 0.22%
• Texas Instruments (TXN) — increase of 16.88%
• WP Carey (WPC) — increase of 0.19%

As a result of these changes, DivGro's PADI will increase by $100.

I like seeing dividend increases above 7%, so five of the eight increases top my expectations, which is quite satisfactory! The arithmetic average of this month's dividend increases is 6.9%, which easily beats inflation.

Transactions

Here is a summary of my transactions in September:

• Oracle (ORCL) — added 100 shares and increased position to 125 shares

I bought 100 shares of ORCL due to the assignment of an option. Details are available here.

This transaction increased DivGro's PADI by about $96.

Markets

I no longer compare DivGro's performance to those of the markets, but it is worth looking at the markets to understand the environment we're investing in:

	DOW 30	S&P 500	NASDAQ Composite	10-YR BOND	CBOE VIX
Aug 31, 2019	26,403.28	2,926.56	7,962.88	1.506%	18.98
Sep 30, 2019	26,916.83	2,976.74	7,999.34	1.675%	16.24

In September, the DOW 30 gained 1.9%, the S&P 500 gained 1.7%, and the NASDAQ gained 0.5%. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note increased to 1.675%, while CBOE's measure of market volatility, the VIX decreased to 16.24.

Portfolio Statistics

Given DivGro's current market value and the total capital invested, the portfolio has returned about 53% since inception. But calculating the IRR (internal rate of return) gives a better measure of portfolio performance, as IRR takes into account the timing and size of deposits since inception. DivGro's IRR is 14.0%.)

I track the yield on cost (YoC) for individual stocks, as well as an average YoC for my portfolio. DivGro's average YoC was unchanged from last month's 3.70%.

Percentage payback relates dividend income to the amount of capital invested. DivGro's average percentage payback is 15.4%, up from last month's 14.8%.

Finally, DivGro's projected annual yield is at 4.66%, up from last month's value of 4.63%. I calculate projected annual yield by dividing PADI ($25,789) by the total amount invested.

Here's a chart showing DivGro's market value breakdown. Dividends are plotted at the base of the chart so we can see them grow over time:

Looking Ahead

I'm on track to achieve my goal of collecting $25,200 in dividend income in 2019. I'm looking forward to the final quarter of 2019 and celebrating DivGro's seventh anniversary in January 2020.

Please see my Performance page for various visuals summarizing DivGro's performance.

Thanks for reading and take care, everybody!