March 2021 Dividends

Greetings all, and thanks again for stopping by.

Here we are, in the early part of another month, which means that it is time to recap the dividend income for the previous month.

Let's get right into the numbers for March:

March 2021 Dividend Summary
Taxable Accounts
Company	Symbol	Date	Amount
WW Grainger	GWW	3/1/2021	$16.83
Enterprise Bancorp Inc	EBTC	3/1/2021	$6.29
Kroger	KR	3/1/2021	$51.48
Aflac Inc.	AFL	3/1/2021	$56.10
Cummins	CMI	3/4/2021	$39.15
Target	TGT	3/10/2021	$21.76
Snap On	SNA	3/10/2021	$46.74
International Business Machines Corp	IBM	3/10/2021	$21.19
Emerson Electric	EMR	3/10/2021	$3.03
3M Corp.	MMM	3/12/2021	$47.36
Walgreens Boots Alliance	WBA	3/12/2021	$91.63
Flower Foods, Inc	FLO	3/19/2021	$13.80
VF Corp	VFC	3/22/2021	$10.29
Vanguard High Yield Dividend ETF	VYM	3/25/2021	$2.37
Qualcomm	QCOM	3/25/2021	$39.61
ProShares S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats ETF	NOBL	3/30/2021	$66.18
iShares Large Cap S&P 500 ETF	IVV	3/31/2021	$53.76
PepsiCorp	PEP	3/31/2021	$37.83
Taxable Accounts Total	$625.40
Roth IRA Account
Company	Symbol	Date	Amount
Aflac Inc.	AFL	3/1/21	$10.23
Vanguard High Yield Dividend ETF	VYM	3/25/21	$26.19
Vanguard Growth ETF	VUG	3/30/21	$3.16
T Rowe Price	TROW	3/30/21	$16.24
iShares Large Cap S&P 500 ETF	IVV	3/31/21	$23.63
iShares Small Cap S&P 500	IJR	3/31/21	$3.91
Roth IRA Account Total	$83.36
Overall Dividend Income Total	$708.76
Forward 12-month Projected Dividend Income Total			$4,811.34

Wow, so $708.76 collected in dividends for March 2021. Those familiar with these updates might say that it sounds like an all-time high for my dividend income in a month, and they would be correct. Thankfully, as long as I continue to avoid dividend cuts/suspensions, reaching all-time highs will be quite common, as I continue with weekly contributions to the portfolio.

Now, let's take a look at my transactions for March 2021:

March 2021 Transactions

Buys

Buys	Qty
CVS	94
KR	19
JNJ	4

• CVS Health (CVS): 94 shares were purchased, resulting in $188 in forward 12-month income. 

Fortunately for me, the company that I work for still pays out yearly bonuses, and I received mine during March, so I put that surplus money to work and purchased additional CVS shares. I have started to hear from multiple sources that CVS is expected to return to increasing the dividend in 2022, and I see it as undervalued at the moment, so I had no qualms in loading up on shares. I have loaded up enough to reach my 5% limit (the most I want to own of any individual stock is 5% of my total portfolio between my taxable brokerage account and my Roth IRA).

• Kroger (KR): 19 shares were purchased, resulting in $13.68 in forward 12-month income.

I continued to add shares of Kroger, as I saw them as undervalued, until I also reached my 5% limit.

• Johnson & Johnson (JNJ): 4 shares were purchased, resulting in $16.16 in forward 12-month income.

Here I went against my usual value investing guideline, as I ran out of undervalued companies that I wanted to invest in, and I decided on a pivot to focus more on the highest quality dividend growth companies that are fairly valued or slightly overvalued. Companies like JNJ rarely every reach an undervalued state, as it is a foundational company for many portfolios (DGI and otherwise) . Over the years, I found it to be out of reach of my usual undervalued range for stocks to add to the portfolio. Inspired a bit by this Dividend Diplomats article, I decided that as long as it not grossly overvalued (ie, greater than 30% over fair value), I will add JNJ where I can. Currently I have the JNJ share price at about 20% over fair value, so I decided to finally add this stalwart to the portfolio. If it does drop to fair value or below, I will just be happy to dollar cost average into more shares of a foundational company.

All totaled, my March 2021 purchases added $217.84 in forward 12-month income. Normally, I would extrapolate this over a 12 month buy period, but I recognize this would not be realistic, as a major part of my money for March 2021 purchases came from an annual bonus, not received every month.

Sells

There were no sells for March 2021

Dividend Income History

Now, let's take a look at my dividend income history, in tabular and graphical form:

Month	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021
Jan	0	$14.38	$14.42	$70.45	$72.34	$97.11	$237.62	$221.32
Feb	0	$49.07	$50.38	$112.01	$190.55	$178.07	$204.19	$186.53
Mar	0	$50.22	$52.16	$182.28	$232.83	$231.81	$422.58	$708.76
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	$220.94
Sep	$54.75	$55.61	$101.70	$226.17	$192.40	$211.61	$579.94
Oct	$10.94	$14.42	$72.53	$79.06	$133.64	$78.18	$132.19
Nov	$48.79	$50.11	$103.31	$158.18	$184.42	$167.86	$241.77
Dec	$63.55	$49.89	$168.03	$234.71	$255.99	$315.70	$603.75

Comparisons to the Previous Quarter and Year

At this point I usually compare to the dividend income from a quarter ago and a year ago. Here are the percent differences for those 2 time periods, on a monthly and quarterly basis:

	%Chg Qtr	%Chg Year
Mar 2021	17.4%	67.7%
Q1 2021	14.2%	29.2%

The 3rd month of the quarter is always my highest paying month, and it is great to see such robust increases in income. Also at play here is the sale of my Lazard Ltd (LAZ) stock, which paid out in the 2nd month of each quarter, and reallocating the funds to mainly stocks that paid dividends in the 3rd month of a quarter.

As stock payouts can sometimes move to different months, especially when their payout normally happens near the end of a particular month, and sometimes those payouts gets slightly delayed into the next month, It may make sense to compare quarters as well. With the completion of Q1 for 2021, the payout for this quarter added up to $1,116.61. The previous quarter, Q4 2020, added up to $977.71. Also, Q1 2020 dividend income totaled $864.39. Thus, the Q1 2021 result amounted to a 14.2% increase over Q4 2020, and a 29.2% increase over Q1 2020.

This look at quarterly income change may provide a more balanced look at increasing income over time, and I believe I will start using it whenever reporting income for the third month of a quarter (March, June, September, and December).

Wrap-Up

So there you have it, my dividend income summary for March 2021. Anytime you can report on an all-time high in income, then it must have been a good month. 

How was your March 2021? Let me know below in the comments!