December 2021 Dividend Income: The Sleeper Has Awakened

 

Well, hello there.  We haven't caught up in a spell.  As I noted on the other page, my computer suffered a literal blue screen of death, forcing me into a bit of a hiatus.  I am back now, however, and eager to jump back into the fray.  It's a good thing too; while I did miss a mid-quarter post, December's numbers are always fascinating to see due to the 401K delivering substantial payouts.  With the DGI community gunning for that cumulative $100K milestone, it'll be interesting to see what will be brought to the table from this neck of the woods.  With that, let's get right to it.

Nasdaq Covered Call ETF (QYLD): $0.04 (+$0.01 QoQ, 

Intel (INTC): $0.05 (+$0.04 QoQ)

J.M. Smucker (SJM): $0.08 (+$0.02 QoQ, 

SJW Group (SJW): $0.41 (+$0.02 QoQ, +$0.08 YoY)

Kroger (KR): $1.34 (+$0.01 QoQ, 

Pfizer (PFE): $0.80 (Same QoQ, +$0.42 YoY)

Johnson & Johnson (JNJ): $0.32 (+$0.02 QoQ, +$0.26 YoY)

AGNC: $0.48 (+$0.03 QoQ, +$0.34 YoY)

Microsoft (MSFT): $0.02

Exxon Mobil (XOM): $1.19 (+$0.10 QoQ, +$0.32 YoY)

Lumen Technologies (LUMN): $0.87 (+$0.05 QoQ, +$0.58 YoY)

Walgreen's Boots Alliance (WBA): $1.00 (+$0.01 QoQ, +$0.05 YoY)

IBM: $0.01

Emerson (EMR): $0.20 (+$0.02 QoQ, +$0.16 YoY)

Target (TGT): $0.16 (+$0.02 QoQ, +$0.13 YoY)

Chevron (CVX): $0.15 (+$0.07 QoQ)

Yum! Brands (YUM): $0.08 (+$0.01 QoQ)

Schwab Equity ETF (SCHD): $0.09

3M (MMM): $0.27 (+$0.02 QoQ, +$0.20 YoY)

GlobalXSuperdividend (SDIV): $0.06 (+$0.02 QoQ)

Orion Office REIT (ONL): $7.58

Main Street Capital (MAIN): $0.03

ConEd (ED): $0.36 (+$0.03 QoQ, +$0.26 YoY)

Stag Industrial (STAG): $0.03 (+$0.01 QoQ)

McDonald's (MCD): $0.22 (+$0.03 QoQ, +$0.17 YoY)

Realty Income (O): $1.18 (+$0.08 QoQ, +$0.18 YoY)

Coca Cola (KO): $0.86 

Wendy's (WEN): $1.13 (+$0.01 QoQ, +$0.62 YoY)

iShares Dividend Growth ETF (DGRO): $0.10

Flowers Foods (FLO): $1.36 (+$0.30 YoY)

Kraft Heinz (KHC): $1.23 (+$0.01 QoQ, +$0.63 YoY)

VF Corp (VFC): $1.08 (+$0.06 QoQ, +$0.09 YoY)

Vanguard Utilities ETF (VPU): $0.37 ($0.33 YoY)

Vanguard Dividend Appreciation ETF (VIG): $0.37 (+$0.08 QoQ, +$0.32 YoY)

Vanguard High Dividend Yield ETF (VYM): $0.83 (+$0.24 QoQ, +$0.66 YoY)

Lockheed Martin (LMT): $0.19 (+$0.05 QoQ)

Vanguard S&P 500 Growth ETF (VOOG): $0.03

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO): $0.27 (+$0.20 YoY)

Domino's (DPZ): $0.05 

Vanguard Total Market ETF (VTI): $0.37 (+$0.11 QoQ, +$0.28 YoY)

Vanguard US REIT Fund (VNQ): $0.69 (+$0.34 QoQ, +$0.53 YoY)

Wisdom Tree (DON): $0.04 (+$0.02 QoQ and YoY)

Invesco High Dividend Low Volatility ETF (SPHD): $0.04

SpartanNash (SPTN): $0.60 

That brings the sub-total to $26.63, which is up $12.82 from last quarter and up $17.23 from last year. Now, granted, that Orion dividend is a fluke.  I don't have a position in that company.  Oddly enough, this isn't the first time that's happened.  It's very bizarre, but I'm not going to question it.

Now, onto the main event of the December dividend post, the 401K numbers.

DFA US Small Cap: $24.06 (+$22.85 YoY)

Baird Aggregate Bond Fund: $1.97 As was the case last year, the dividend was split across two paydays.  I decided to just lump them together this time around for simplicity's sake

American EuroPacific Growth: $19.22 (+$18.06 YoY)

T. Rowe Price: $88.98 (+76.18 YoY)

*Does spit take*

Jeebus.  Those numbers and that growth is absurd.  

That sub-total comes to $134.23

*Does spit take*

Grand total comes to...160.86

*Does spit take*

Stop it!

Sorry.   Those numbers.  Just wow.  And this is not too long after I said that the 401K wasn't the dividend engine I thought it could be.  I think I made it angry.  I'd apologize, but I kind of like it when it's angry.

So, yeah.  That's a new record.  I've said that the day could come when December surpassed the mid-quarters but I didn't expect anything like that.  That wasn't even close.  Mid-quarters got curb-stomped.  Here I was hyped to break the $50 threshold and we blow past the triple digits instead.  

Oh, and interest clocked in at $3.55

In addition to the buys on Robinhood (which you can read about here, here, here, here, and here) I also made single share buys over on E-Trade for Kraft Heinz (KHC), People's United Bank (PBCT), Tanger Outlet (SKT), Omega Health (OHI), and Westrock (WRK). Nothing too crazy in terms of price, but still a pretty active month.

It might seem a little strange that I hit the mid-quarter payers that hard.  You'd think it would be to close this newfound gap, but there's another reason.  Though, maybe that could be a goal for the year?   We'll see.

2021 certainly went out with a bang.  I don't see that being broken anytime soon. It'll be interesting to see what next December's numbers look like.  I highly doubt there will be that kind of growth, but I still can't help but be curious.  We've got a ways to go before that point.  2022 has only just begun.  As Al Bundy used to always say....let's rock.

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Robinhood Buys: 12/30/2021

 

Bonus round to close out the year

AT&T (T): $7

Hormel (HRL): $7

Proctor & Gamble (PG): $7

Paychex (PAYX): $7

Kinder Morgan (KMI): $7

General Dynamics (GD): $7

Microsoft (MSFT): $7

Intel (INTC): $7

Chevron (CVX): $7

J.M. Smucker (SJM): $7

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Robinhood Buys: 12/21/21

 

Free time between shifts=time for stock buys

Starbucks (SBUX): $3

Campbell's (CPB): $3

Verizon (VZ): $3

Realty Income (O): $3

GlobalXSuperdividend (SDIV): $1

Wisdom Tree Midcap Dividend Fund (DON): $1

Invesco High Dividend Low Volatility ETF (SPHD): $3

AGNC: $3

Stag Industrial (STAG): $3

Main Street Capital (MAIN): $1

GlobalX Nasdaq 100 Covered Call ETF (QYLD): $1

SJW Group (SJW): $3

Lockheed (LMT): $3

Exxon Mobil (XOM): $3

Man, done with the batches already.  Getting a bonus wild card round in before the month's end will be pretty cool.  It'll not only help wrap up the year, but hopefully get some momentum going for the year ahead.

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Reallocating 401k Contribution Capital

 The 401k isn't quite the dividend engine that I had envisioned.  There are only about a dozen or so funds to choose from, so when I first set it up, I had a fairly even spread across all of them.  Diversification and balance seemed like the way to go.  After all, this is the 401k we're talking about.  It's heavy stuff. You want it to be sturdy and resilient so that your golden years can truly shine.

With dividends being the new name of the game, I decided it was time to tweak things a bit.  There are quite a few funds that don't pay dividends, or at least show no evidence of it. As such, I decided to skim a little from the money that I was putting into a couple of those non-dividend funds and redirect it towards Publix stock.

It may seem counter-intuitive, moving from broader funds to a single company stock, but I think this is going to work out well in the long term.  Not only does that help the company, but it gets me more shares, and subsequently, more dividend income.  In addition, the dividends from the shares in the 401k actually do reinvest, so that will spur even more growth going forward. I was able to more than double the amount I was directing towards the stock, so it'll be interesting to see how that ends up working out over the course of the next couple of years. 

On the off chance this doesn't work, and the rate of return isn't as good, I can always change it back or do another re-shuffle. 

The cool thing about this is that it's still the same amount of money (sort of, we'll talk about that in the December dividend post,) but I'll still see a boost in income.  Yeah, I can't touch it for another 20+ years, but it'll get that snowball rolling faster in the meantime.

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Robinhood Buys: 12/9/2021

 

Afternoon off? Seems like as good a reason as any to buy some stocks.

Vanguard Total Market ETF (VTI): $7

Vanguard High Dividend Yield ETF (VYM): $7

Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO): $7

Vanguard US REIT Fund (VNQ): $7

Vanguard Dividend Appreciation ETF (VIG): $7

Vanguard Utilities ETF (VPU): $7

Vanguard S&P 500 Growth ETF (VOOG): $7

iShares Dividend Growth ETF (DGRO): $7

Schwab US Dividend Equity ETF (SCHD): $7

Three rounds already?  Eh, it works.  I've got lost time for which to make up and I see no problem in picking up the pace in general.  I maxed out this round too, so hopefully that'll help a little.

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Robinhood Buys: 12/6/2021

 

Let's keep the momentum going, shall we?

3M (MMM): $4

Johnson & Johnson (JNJ): $4

Emerson (EMR): $4

PepsiCo (PEP): $4

AT&T (T): $4

Target (TGT): $4

McDonald's (MCD): $4

ConEd (ED): $4

Proctor & Gamble (PG): $4

Vanguard Total Market ETF (VTI): $4.07

Not sure how that seven cents appeared in my account.  I generally just keep the cash balance to even dollar figures, but since it was there, I figured I might as well deploy it. 

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Robinhood Buys: 12/2/2021

 

Was going to try to lay low and do a whole "time skip" thing going into 2022, but when work annoys you, you've gotta buy the stocks.  So, here we go.

Johnson & Johnson (JNJ): $4

Papa John's (PZZA): $4

Domino's (DPZ): $4

Yum! (YUM): $4

Exxon Mobil (XOM): $4

AT&T (T): $4

Verizon (VZ): $4

Realty Income (O): $4

Lockheed (LMT): $4

SJW (SJW): $4

Felt good to get back into it.

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