Stock Sale --- TUP

Today I sold my entire TUP position.

• TUP:  61.36 shares @ $73.57 --- Yield  3.70%

Total proceeds are $4507.13 and this will reduce my yearly dividends by $166.90.

This has been a fantastic position for me and I made about $1400 in gains plus whatever dividends I received while owning the stock. Yesterday I was thinking that I might want to trim some overvalued positions and TUP at $65 seemed like a good candidate. Well when I opened my account this morning looking for opportunities to buy, I saw TUP up 12% at $73 and took that as an opportunity to sell.

I fully plan to reinvest the proceeds quickly and have no problems revisiting TUP somewhere in the $50s and in the 5% yield range.

Forward dividends are $8670.00.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Recent Sell --- FLO

I just had a $20 limit order executed and I sold my entire position of FLO today.

• FLO:  120 shares @ $20.01 --- Yield  3.2%

Total proceeds from this transaction are $2393.65 and my yearly dividends will be reduced by $76.80.

I originally purchased the shares back in September for $14.62 and I planned on adding to the position, but as many stocks have done over the past couple of months the shares got away from me. When the yield was in 4.5% range, FLO seemed like a steal, but now it's just another 3% yielder and quite frankly I am happy to take the 37% gain and redeploy into another better quality 3% yielder.

Forward dividends are back around 5k. I have some work to do in the next few weeks.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

GS exchanged for JNJ --- DJIA 19500 (WOW)

Today I sold my GS position and initiated a position in JNJ.

• GS:  12.05 shares @ $235.04 --- Yield  1.11%
• JNJ:  27 shares @ $110.62 --- Yield  2.89%

Total new capital invested is only $168.84, but will raise my net yearly dividends will increase by $55.07 since the difference in yields is so large between the two companies.

Rational:

I bought GS a few months back at $141 and a 2% yield and it is now almost $100 a share higher with a 1.1% yield. It has been a while since I have sold a position and really didn't want to. I must admit seeing a 63% in a just a few months combined with a 1% yield made the decision much easier.

Also I have been trying to create a more traditional DGI portfolio and JNJ fits within with that strategy much better than GS. I am closely watching massive gains in M, MET, and GM as well. These companies are some of my biggest gainers in recent months and I may slowly drop them as well and look for other DG companies. I will most likely keep GM because of its high yield and strong earnings growth.

JNJ is not cheap, but is cheaper. It may get even cheaper which is fine with me. 3% and 7-10% yearly dividend growth is awesome! 

Forward dividends are $5100.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Recent sale --- WMT & Shell

The recent run up in oil prices has given a good opportunity to lighten my position.

• RDS-b:  157.89 shares @ $46.24
• WMT:  42.09 share @ $66.21

Total proceeds from these transactions is $10,073.81.  My yearly dividends will decrease by $676.16.

I was a little under water in both companies and I can use the short term loss to help lower my options gains.

In a perfect world 31 days from now both will be trading 20% lower. :-)

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Massive sell and KMI unwind

Yesterday I dumped my KMI stock and closed my one week week Kinder call. Overall I lost about $50 on the one day trade. Not too bad. In other news I dumped a ton of shares yesterday. Maybe I should buy some today? :-)

I am now down to about 10% stocks and 90% cash. It feels strange and good at the same time. I have no idea what the market is doing today and really don't care. I plan to enjoy the holidays and will probably wait until the beginning of next year to eliminate the rest of my positions.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Wrecking ball...meet my portfolio.

Sharebuilder too..... :-(

The carnage is NOT over yet. As you can see, the selling has been indiscriminate. I plan on selling a lot more by year end.

I think this covers all the sales so far. The total is up to around $200k. My monthly dividends are definitely dropping and will really take a hit by January.

By early February I will be close to 100% cash, so I will be back at the bottom of the mountain looking up again. I will start putting new money to work and simplify the portfolio then. Most likely I will stay at 25 positions or less with no mutual funds.


Stay tuned.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Stock sale: CAG

After a pretty big spike in price today, I decided to sell all of my CAG shares. As you can see in the photo above, it was a relatively small position. I was able to make three weekly purchases, two under $30, one just over $30 last summer.

The dividend hasn't been raised for a couple of years, but ironically the stock performance has been very strong. In fact between KRFT and CAG, the food companies have been two of my better performing companies in the last year.

Including the four dividends I received I will clear $2756.57 on an investment of $1850.

I haven't decided what to do with the proceeds yet. I may add to my KO or PEP positions and keep the money invested in some type of food company.

Also CAG was paying a $.25 quarterly dividend, so my yearly dividends will decrease by $63.84.


What do you guys think of my decision to dump CAG?

Weekly Sharebuilder Purchases and Funds Sold

Here are my automatic investments for this week.

• RDS-B: 4.03 shares @ $62.06 --- Yield  6.06%
• BBL:  5.77 shares @ $43.29 --- Yield  5.73%
• SO:  5.65 shares @ $44.23 --- Yield  4.75%  (initial position)
• JNJ:  2.49 shares @ $100.56 --- Yield  2.78%

Total capital invested is $1000 ($250 in each company) and the combined yield of these purchases is 4.83%. This will add $48.30 to my yearly dividends.

I also sold $6000 worth of my mutual fund holdings ($3000 of CAIBX and AHITX). This sale will reduce my yearly dividends by approximately $285.

I plan on reinvesting the proceeds by the end of this week. One of the biggest factors in selling off some of the junk bonds is the major tax disadvantage. Keeping high yield bonds in a taxable account when my top rate this year was 33% is not a good idea. I may look at investing the AHITX proceeds in higher yield municipal bonds or increase my utility holdings which have similar yields but are taxed at 15% .

SO doesn't look very cheap here, but considering it was in the $53 range a couple of months ago, I decided it might be worth while to start building a position. I think it is a decent substitute for my high yield bonds.

Stocks on my radar for next week include the ones listed above as well as PG, PM, T, CVX, and XOM.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Weekly Sharebuilder Purchases and Funds Sold

Here are my automatic investments for this week.

• RDS-b:  4.76 shares @ $62.91 --- Yield  5.98%
• PM:  3.95 shares @ $76.00 --- Yield  5.26%
• NOV:  6.01 shares @ $49.96 --- Yield  3.68%

Total capital invested is $900 ($300 invested in each company). The combined yield on today's purchases is 4.97% and will add $44.76 to my yearly dividends.

This is the lowest price I can remember purchasing PM. I will probably continue to add even though it is my largest position. It still seems odd to me how PM and MO have continued to head in opposite directions over the past couple of years.

I also started the process of dismantling my mutual fund holdings yesterday. Overall I have a little over $120k spread across two funds CAIBX and AHITX. I started the process with a relatively small reduction. I will sell a similar amount of my junk bonds withing the next month as well. Capital gains will come into play with this transition so I will most likely take my time with the process.

I sold 100 shares of CAIBX yesterday at $59.97. which will net me $5997 and will reduce my yearly dividends by $200.00.

I have not decided if I will make one larger purchase or just keep averaging in on a weekly basis. Most likely I will use some type of combination.

Companies on my radar for next week include JNJ, CAT, XOM, CVX, BBL, NOV, PM, RDS-b, UL, and KO.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

Stock Sale: ARCP

Today I decided to stop dragging my feet and just bit the bullet.

• Stock sold:  ARCP  195.27 shares @ $9.43 --- Yield:  0%

This transaction will net me $1840.48. Luckily I had a free trade with Sharebuilder so at least that reduces the pain a bit. Since ARCP was paying $1.00/share in dividends, technically my yearly dividends are decreasing by $195.27. The reality is they have already decreased prior to this sale

My cost basis was $12.47 so I have a capital loss of $594.54. Total dividends received from ARCP during 2014 were $94.41.

The two remain REITs within my portfolio are HCP and DLR which I purchased during the summer and fall of 2013. These two companies, unlike ARCP, have performed exceptionally well. In fact I am close to having a double in DLR. I have no plans to eliminate these positions.

I will allocate the proceeds to my weekly Sharebuilder purchases during the next several weeks.

Mutual Fund Sale: ABALX

I started the year wanting to transition from mutual funds to stocks and today I sold off my shares of ABALX.  I owned 589.16 shares and the sale price is $25.61. The proceeds are $15,088.34 and this will reduce my yearly divideneds by $229.34.  The S&P 500 is current sitting at 1991.

I probably won't sell any more mutual fund shares this year because the taxes from the Intel sale, this sale, and my dividends are starting to become scary. 

There are no immediate plans to reinvest the proceeds.  I certainly want to continue the diversification process going forward.  I will be looking for larger block purchases separate from my normal weekly purchases much like when I invested in KRFT and AFL after selling the INTC shares. 

BBL is high on my radar since its recent pullback and I would also like to buy JNJ and XOM.  I may just pull the trigger on all three even though the market continues to make new all-time highs. 

Again I don't believe in timing the markets because it doesn't seem to pay to wait.  I will continue dollar cost averaging throughout all market cycles until I reach enough passive income to exit the rat race.

Stock sale: 200 shares of Intel

Today I decided to sell all 200 shares of Intel for $34.57 which nets me $6889.09 after commisions. This will decrease my yearly dividends by $180.00.

After yet another $.225 dividend was declared this morning I felt the need to pull the trigger.  Owning a 2.6% yielding stock with no dividend growth does not seem like a prudent decision. 

From a performance standpoint, Intel has actually has dominated the other Dow components so far this year.  It is up an amazing 32% while the next best performer, Microsoft is up just under 20%.  The DJIA has barely moved 3% this year. 

I actually believed Intel would raise the dividend this quarter after a great earnings season with good future guidance.  Intel may very well continue rising to $40 a share or higher, but I am looking to reach FI as soon as possible. This means I will welcome low yielders with high dividend growth as well as high yielders with slow growth.  Low yielding stocks with no growth are classified as speculative investments in my book and are not aligned with my philosopy or long term goals.

I have not decided where to allocate the proceeds, but I still like MSFT, CSCO, and IBM in the tech space and may add to these positions.  I really feel good about their commitment to continue raising dividends going forward.  I also still need to create positions in JNJ, XOM, and MCD.  I will have to think about this for a little while.