PARA - Dividend Income Summary: Lanny's April 2023 Summary
2023-05-06 04:02:00 ET
Summary
- Investing in dividend stocks allows you to earn dividend income, the best passive income stream.
- Dividend Income is my primary vehicle on the road to Financial Freedom, which you can see through my Dividend Portfolio.
- Growing your dividend income takes time and consistency. Investing as often, and early, as you can allows compound interest to work its magic.
This is what dividend investing is all about! Investing in dividend stocks allows you to earn dividend income, the best passive income stream! Bias, you better believe it.
Time to dive into Lanny's April 2023 dividend income results! Were records set? Almost to financial freedom? One day and one month at a time!
Dividend Income
Dividend Income is the fruit from the labor of investing your money in the stock market. Further, Dividend Income is my primary vehicle on the road to Financial Freedom, which you can see through my Dividend Portfolio .
How do I research & screen for dividend stocks prior to making a purchase? I use our Dividend Diplomat Stock Screener and trade on Ally's investment platform (one of our Financial Freedom Products), as well as SoFi's (SOFI) investing application - commission free.
I also automatically invest and max out, pre-tax, my 401(k) through work and my Health Savings Account. This allows me to save a ton of money on taxes (aka thousands), which allows me to invest even more. In addition, all dividends I receive are automatically being reinvested back into the company that paid the dividend, aka Dividend Reinvestment Plan or DRIP for short. This takes the emotion out of timing the market and builds onto my passive income stream!
Growing your dividend income takes time and consistency. Investing as often, and early, as you can allows compound interest (aka dividends) to work its magic. I have gone from making $2.70 in a single month in dividend income to well over … $10,000+ in a single month. A new dividend income record was set in December of 2021. Unfortunately, did not break it in December 2022. However…was it broken this month? The power of compounding and dividend reinvestment is a wonderful component to the portfolio. Each and every month, whether big or small, I continue to report the passive income that dividend investing provides me. Why?
*Not pictured is my wife's dividend income above*
I want to show you that dividend investing makes it possible to achieve financial freedom and/or financial independence. We all start somewhere, but consistently investing, compounding (reinvesting) dividends and keeping it simple, allows you to be in a significantly better position than most. Further, if I can grow this portfolio and income stream, you can too.
Dividend income - April 2023
Now, on to the numbers… In April, we (my wife and I) received a dividend income total of $1,596.82 . We crossed $1,000 yet again and I don't see us taking any steps back, only forward.
Always keep this in mind, the amount and number of stocks listed below show you what it means to buy and hold for the long term. Most of the positions I have owned for years , let dividend growth and reinvestment do its thing. This is what dividend investing for financial freedom is all about. The passive income stream is growing at a rapid pace. Over a decade of investing is snowballing on its own, but we keep investing as much as we can.
Here is the breakdown of dividend income for the month of April, between taxable and retirement (far right column, under "Retirement") accounts. In addition, "W" means my wife's account:
So what happened in dividend income this month?
Philip Morris (PM) essentially is saying hold my cigarette, let me send Lanny $150 in dividend income. Absolutely love it.
My new REIT, Broadstone Net Lease (BNL) is also touching close to the $100 mark. This was the REIT I invested in, post-sale of STORE Capital.
Total Energies (TTE) also produced over $100 in dividends for me this quarter. Big oil is setting massive records, left and right.
On the retirement income side, my 401(k) mutual fund investment is Fidelity's S&P 500 (FXAIX) and that dividend was huge, at $483. The payout is quarterly but typically comes a month after the quarter ends.
I also split out my retirement accounts in the far right column and the taxable account dividends are in the left two columns. The retirement accounts are composed of HSA investments, ROTH and Traditional IRAs, as well as our work 401(k) accounts. In total, the retirement accounts brought in a total dividend income amount of $754.36 or 42% of the dividend income total. We were still successful in earning over $1,000+ in taxable dividends during April, let's go !
Dividend Income Year-over-Year Comparison
2022:
2023:
Our dividend income was fortunately up by $693.38 or 42%. Crushing growth, which we will see truly why in the next few paragraphs below. Almost doubling up on last year's income is a very cool sight! What happened to the dividend income year-over-year?
First, Fidelity's S&P 500 Mutual Fund paid out in April for me. Boom, that's a $483 impact right there, the majority of the increase.
Second, BNL, the REIT, is much higher than STORE Capital, because the yield is slightly higher, and I've been buying more of them. This dividend check was $17 higher.
Third, Canadian Imperial (CM) is a combination of 3 things. Dividend growth, dividend reinvestment and buying a few more shares here and there. That was $16 higher.
Lastly, all dividend increases and reinvestment fueled most of the remainder. We are talking Philip Morris, Cisco (CSCO), and Realty Income (O), just to name a few.
Overall, an incredible dividend month. April 2024 goal would be sweet to have $2,500. Let's go ! Keep on investing.
Dividend Increases
Dividend increases kept the train moving from March into April, with 7 dividend increases show-cased below!
The largest surprise came from Discover Financial (DFS). A 16.66% dividend increase was not anticipated, and this added almost $16 to our forward dividend income alone!
We also had two dividend kings increase their dividend as usual in April. The likes of Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and Procter & Gamble (PG) both increased their dividend at lower-than-normal rates. High inflation may be impacting their margins, with JNJ's spin-off coming up as well; not to mention the settlement of the talc lawsuits.
In total, the dividend increases created $62.67 in additional passive dividend income. I would need to invest $1,790 at a 3.50% dividend yield in order to add that income. Thank you for the increases, as I didn't have to come up with the capital to create that form of income!
Dividend Income Conclusion & Summary
The name of the game is to apply what you learn through financial education. The next steps are to maximize every dollar for investment opportunities and live life on your own terms. My plan is to demonstrate that dividend income can be a revenue engine; a revenue engine that allows you to take back control of your life, a revenue engine to help you reach financial freedom. Dividend investing, once you learn the right way, becomes easier and starts to immensely make sense!
Excited for the future, no doubt. Further, all of the investing from last year and moves this year show that my aim to save 60% of my income , and make every dollar count , has provided the dividend growth.
As always, thank you for stopping by. Leave your comments and questions below. Good luck and happy investing everyone!
Editor's Note: The summary bullets for this article were chosen by Seeking Alpha editors.
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Dividend Income Summary: Lanny's April 2023 Summary