Bert’s December Dividend Income Summary

Well, Lanny started our dividend income summary party off with quite a bang.  Almost $5,500 Lanny!  U n b e l i e v a b l e.  That is how you motivate me and the rest of this awesome dividend investing community.   Like Lanny, I am happy to say that my wife and I posted a personal record in December and I’m excited to share the results!

Dividend income Summary

Dividend Investing is amazing for so many reasons.  As we continue to build a growing, passive income stream by investing in undervalued dividend growth stocks identified by our dividend stock screener, it is always important to track your progress and make sure you are achieving your goals.  Seeing the progress makes the income feel real.  And eventually, one day, it will help you reach the highly coveted financial freedom.

See – The Dividend Stock Screener that helps us identify undervalued dividend growth stocks

See – Our Dividend Income Summaries each month since 2014

For the last five years, we have logged out dividend income results.  The totals are summarized  on our dividend income page.  You can see first hand the results that each dividend stock purchase, dividend increases, and each reinvested dividend has had.  We continue to fuel the FI/RE one purchase, one increase, and one DRIP at a time.   So that is why I am always so excited to type up my monthly dividend income summary.  To review the results and hold myself accountable.  With that in mind, here is my October dividend income summary.

See – The Individual Holdings in Our Dividend Stock Portfolios

Bert’s December Dividend Income Summary

In December, my wife and I received $3,809.07 in dividend income.  That’s a 51.1% increase compared to the $2,520.29 total last year.  As I mentioned earlier, this was a PERSONAL RECORD for us and we look forward to working to beat this mark once again in 2020!  Here is a detailed listing of the individual holdings that paid us dividends during the month:

Dividends received in December

Here are some highlights and notes about the month:

  • Obviously, the impact of mutual funds was real this month.  I don’t know about you, but I received some INSANE capital gains distributions from our fund family holdings.  This isn’t too surprising given the strong market; however, I am still shocked by just how much income that produced for me in 2019.  Hopefully the market continues to rise and this trend continues next year.
  • For the record, displaying mutual incomes was not the easiest this year.  Our retirement accounts changed mutual funds at various points in 2019.  Further, we moved HSA’s several times.  First, after leaving an employer, I switched my HSA account to Lively, a free online HSA account that allows you to invest your funds freely using a TD Ameritrade brokerage.  I loved Lively; however, I transitioned all of my accounts to Fidelity during the summer to consolidate accounts into one brokerage.  So I transfered my HSA once again from Lively to Fidelity.  I’ll tell you what.  Having all investment accounts under one roof has been AMAZING.  The SPYD/SPTM dividend in the chart comes into play.  Second, rather than display each individual mutual fund and try to compare, I just consolidate my mutual fund payouts and my wifes into one line item.
  • This year, we took advantage of a dip in 3M’s stock price and built up our positions.  You can see the new dividend received and it was nice to get that big check from one of my “Always Buy” companies.
  • Like 3M, we also have built up our positions in Exxon Mobil over the last 12 months.  The oil market continues to be volatile and quite frankly, interesting to follow.  I think I am done adding for now; however, if their price were to fall into the mid-$60s, I would have to buy.  Maybe I’ll shift gears and add to Royal Dutch Shell, one of the companies on Lanny’s January watch list instead.  I received a dividend from them this month and it was one of my first dividend stocks purchased.  But that dividend could always be larger, right??
  • Other than that, you can see the impact of stock purchases and dividend increases.  I didn’t want to highlight each one; however, it continues to amaze me the impact time has on your dividend stock portfolio.

Bert’s December Dividend Stock Portfolio Update

After announcing that our portfolio crossed a major investing milestone lin November, I am trying to continue pushing forward in my quest towards financial freedom.  In this section of the article, I discuss stock purchases and dividend increases received.  Both of which help point the dividend arrow higher, and higher.

Read: Milestone Achieved – Crossing $10,000 in Projected Dividend Income

First, let’s look at the impact from stock purchases and 401(k) contributions.  I’ll keep this section rather brief since I wrote about my November and December stock purchases.  After the article was published, I simply added 5 more shares to Canadian Imperial.  Since I covered the stocks in detail, and my only addition was to a company that I discussed, I won’t elaborate further in this article.  If you want more information, my last purchase article summarizes each stock purchase made in November and December.   In total, purchases and 401(k) contributions added $103.51 to my forward dividend income.  Not too bad, not too bad

Dividend income added by December stock purchases

Now, on to dividend increases.  Dividend increases are the name of our game and will help fuel the growth of our dividend income stream without lifting a finger.  Lanny and I are ALWAYS watching dividend increases and share each one with each other.  Quite frankly, it is a blast tracking them.

Individual dividend increases received in December

This month was a pretty solid month of dividend increases, per the table above.  While none of the dividend increases were large individually, in aggregate, the impact was strong.  AT&T provided us with their standard $.01 per share increase in their quarterly dividend and PFE followed suit with their recent $.02 per share increase.  I’ll never complain about the size of an increase, especially when they add $27.36 to my forward dividend income.

Read: Expected Dividend Increases in January 2020

Summary

This was a very exciting way to close out 2019.  A new personal record is always great.  But what excites me is that I was able to continue to add dividend income via purchases and increases.  My goal for 2020 is to continue building on this momentum, continue pushing harder, and continue increasing my forward dividend income.  Watching Lanny’s growth over the year and his recent insane totals is all the motivation I need to see that investing consistently and frugal living works.   It is simple and that’s why I’m going to work harder to make EVERY DOLLAR COUNT in 2020.

How did you perform in December?  Did you set any new records?  Did you have strong mutual fund capital gains distributions as well?  How many new companies paid you a dividend?

Bert

22 thoughts on “Bert’s December Dividend Income Summary

  1. Wow Bert. You are your own Santa! Must be a great feeling getting such a return, especially from the 401Ks.
    You will be so proud of yourselves when you are
    Both you and Lanny are super lucky to have a nice 401k. My employer’s kind of sucks.
    What’s your take on a Traditional 401K vs a Roth?
    cheers!
    John

    • John,

      I think my portfolio si more like Santa because that’s what delivered us these nice dividend gifts 🙂 What’s funny is that my current employer doesn’t have the best 401(k) plan, ironically. In the past yes, but the place I’ve been for the last 10 months, not a chance. It doesn’t even have an S&P 500 mutual fund with a ticker. Rather, its at Principal and is a “seperate account.” I’m sure dividends are included in there, I just can’t see them so I can’t report them.

      What’s the deal with you employer’s plan? High fees? Pool plan options?

      Bert

  2. Fantastic Bert! Over $3,800 is huge and nearly $1,300 more than last year. I’m not sure what our mutual fund distributions were like in December. My 401k doesn’t break them out and I haven’t check my Vanguard mutual funds. I’m sure they were solid though.

  3. Hi Bert congrats on the records. Just had large buys of 3 oil giants and some in REITs, one in Baltics (micro on global level and unknown to you all) and another one BPY. MMM and CSCO is also on my radar

    • Thank you P2035! I appreciate the kind words. Those oil giant purchases must have added a huge sum to your dividend income. I’d love to add to CSCO if the price started to slide down again. But I’m keeping a close eye on it right now.

      Bert

  4. Another monster December i’m seeing the community, congratulations to you and everyone who has benefited from what has been a great year of equities. I’m getting closer to hitting the 4 digit mark on my end, fingers crossed its in 2020

    Here’s hoping there’s more to come 🙂

    • haha yes we both were very fortunate this December. What’s crazy is seeing how many other people in the community have been crushing it as well in December. 2019 was a great year for many. Hopefully you’re right about $5k in December. If the markets finish the year as strong has this year, then were have a chance.

      Bert

  5. Well done, Bert. You’re firing on all cylinders. I enjoyed the highlights and notes section in this post. It’s some good insight on what you are thinking with regard to your portfolio.
    Your list of dividend payers is so large, it’s like reading the fine print in a contract. Definitely a good problem to have. ????
    All the best as we kick off 2020.

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