July 2020 Dividends

Hello everyone,

Thanks once again for stopping by. 

Can you believe it is August 2020 already? Time is sure flying by in this crazy year. I won't beat a dead horse and bring sand to the beach by complaining about 2020, but it is amazing how quickly the year is going by.

With the start of a new month, you know that it is time for another dividend update, so let's get to it! 

Here is a look at my dividends received for July:

July 2020 Dividend Summary
Taxable Accounts
Company	Symbol	Date	Amount
UGI Corp	UGI	7/1/2020	$5.61
ProShares S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats ETF	NOBL	7/1/2020	$72.74
Cardinal Health	CAH	7/15/2020	$13.12
Bank OZK	OZK	7/20/2020	$62.40
Cisco Systems	CSCO	7/22/2020	$10.08
Taxable Accounts Total	$163.95
Roth IRA Account
Company	Symbol	Date	Amount
Kimberly-Clark	KMB	7/2/20	$10.29
Cardinal Health	CAH	7/15/20	$13.71
WP Carey	WPC	7/15/20	$11.65
Powershares QQQ Trust	QQQ	7/31/20	$5.17
Toronto Dominion Bank	TD	7/31/20	$14.78
Roth IRA Account Total	$55.60
Overall Dividend Income Total	$219.55
Forward 12-month Projected Dividend Income Total			$3,775.75

With these tallies, I don't include dividends from my 401k account.

As usual for the first month in a quarter, NOBL and OZK pretty much carry the weight for most of the dividend income. They combined for $135.14, which is 61.6% of my dividend income for the month. Hopefully they keep it coming.

Now let's take a look at my transactions for July:

Transactions

Buys	Qty
AFL	14
AMP	8
EBTC	3

14 shares of Aflac (AFL) purchased adds $15.68 of yearly dividend income.

8 shares of Ameriprise (AMP) purchased adds $33.28 of yearly dividend income.

3 shares of Enterprise Bancorp (EBTC) purchased adds $2.10 of yearly dividend income.

All totaled, my July purchases result in $51.06 of added yearly dividend income.

Of course, the great thing about dividend growth investing is that there is the opportunity for that income to grow each year even without purchasing more shares as these companies maintain their streaks of increasing their dividend payouts annually. That of course gets accelerated if more shares are bought.

There were no sells for July.

My Current Thoughts:

Another month, and we are still well in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. You wouldn't know it, though, just by looking at the stock market, as there is still much optimism to be found there, while people are still out of work, the virus is spreading here in the U.S., and people are still dying from it. Just earlier this week, I came across a guy playing his saxophone outside of the grocery, with a sign asking for any donations as he was trying to raise money to help his family pay his rent while out of work. It is truly heartbreaking to see, and in the back of my mind, I'm hoping that we are not on the road to another depression. Since I am in a fortunate position of having a well-paying job (and writing about dividend income), I did give a little something to help. Of course his sign could be totally fake, but I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt.

So as mentioned in previous updates, it appears COVID-19 is with us for the long haul, and is no longer a matter of a few months. Recently, I have been watching documentaries on the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 (which ended up lasting a few years). I am seeing eerie similarities with the current pandemic, where it appears with all the advancements in medicine and technology, human nature in the face of a pandemic has not advanced much, unfortunately, as many of the things that helped the virus spread then is helping it spread now. People (especially here in the U.S.) are still refusing to do the things needed to stop it from spreading (refusing to wear masks, not social distancing, attending events as if the virus is gone, etc.). Oddly enough, in countries where people are willing to do these things for the common good, the spread has stopped or has significantly slowed (wonders never cease). 

So, we're managing life with a pandemic, and we may be talking about it continuing for a matter of years instead of months. Or maybe this is just the new normal, with other future pandemics lurking around the corner...

Ok, probably time to bring it back to dividends...

Dividend Income History

Back to the July update, let's take a look at historical dividend income, in tabular and graphical form:

Month	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020
Jan	0	$14.38	$14.42	$70.45	$72.34	$97.11	$237.62
Feb	0	$49.07	$50.38	$112.01	$190.55	$178.07	$204.19
Mar	0	$50.22	$52.16	$182.28	$232.83	$231.81	$422.58
Apr	0	$10.83	$27.91	$64.56	$78.40	$70.34	$204.78
May	0	$46.52	$59.42	$132.14	$162.41	$187.18	$220.09
Jun	$6.69	$47.51	$90.97	$198.86	$259.18	$195.35	$473.99
Jul	0	$18.99	$51.37	$168.64	$102.00	$80.81	$219.55
Aug	$33.96	$50.11	$86.07	$156.46	$183.50	$192.45
Sep	$54.75	$55.61	$101.70	$226.17	$192.40	$211.61
Oct	$10.94	$14.42	$72.53	$79.06	$133.64	$78.18
Nov	$48.79	$50.11	$103.31	$158.18	$184.42	$167.86
Dec	$63.55	$49.89	$168.03	$234.71	$255.99	$315.70

As usual, the dividend income for the 1st month of the quarter (July) is expected to be the lowest of the quarter (Q3). So I guess that means it's uphill for the rest of Q3! Most of my recent buys are adding income to the 3rd month of the quarter, so that is where most of my dividend income gains will be seen (hello March, June, September, December).

Looking back at a quarter ago, and a year ago, this is the change in dividend income:

	%Chg Qtr	%Chg Year
Jul 2020	7.21%	171.69%

  

A slight increase over the last quarter, but a huge increase over the last year! This has helped bring my income for the 1st month of the quarter pretty close to the income for the 2nd month of the quarter. I continue to add weekly to the best values in my portfolio, and see where the income lands from month to month. The train shall keep going, and I continue to enjoy the ride!

So that's a wrap for July 2020 dividends. 

How was your July? Let me know below in the comments!