Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Income/expense January 2017

My goal when it comes to saving rate is as I wrote here 70 %. I'm usually a frugal person, but this month I managed to spend a lot of money. I don't have any regrets. I experienced a lot and as the kids says yolo!

Expenses: 32 120 SEK
Income: 32 250 SEK
Saving rate: 0.4 %

I've added a new feature to my blog. It's a spreadsheet where you can track my income and expenses. It can be found via this page.

Monday, January 30, 2017

New purchases

Today I invested the last part of my salary.
  • 10 T for $ 41.72 per share and a yield of 4.65 %.
  • 7 EMR for $ 58.99 per share and a yield of 3.25 %.
  • 5 ABBV for $ 60.16 per share and a yield of 4.25 %.
They all pay a quarterly dividend and these purchases will give me $ 14.7, $ 13.44  and $ 9.6 for at total amount of $ 37.74. The total amount is quite a bit lower than my earlier purchases, but this is because I will only receive dividend from T and ABBV for three quarters. Next year will be bettter :). I've updated my portfolio and as always it can be found here.

If my calculations are correct this means that the purchase made in January will give me $ 143.16 this year. With the current exchange rate that is 1345 SEK which gives me a yield of 4.48 %. 

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Short term watchlist

I still have some money from my salary to invest. This is list is an update of an earlier blog post. My portfolio will be in "diversification mode" for a long time, meaning I will increase the number of companies that I invest in. From March and onward I will broaden my geographical search area to include the Nordic countries as well. I'm thinking that I will invest half in dividend aristocrats and the other half in quality stocks from a certain country, so stay tuned.

This time I will choose from (ticker, yield, eps):
  • T, 4.69, 17.79
  • EMR, 3.19, 24.43
  • MCD, 3.10, 22.67
  • PG, 3.08, 24.62
  • ABBV, 4.16, 16.5
Do you have any thoughts or comments on my plans?

Thursday, January 26, 2017

New purchases

So I've made some purchases yesterday. I bought the three stocks with the highest yield from my earlier blog post.
  • 10 KO for $ 42.15 per share and a yield of 3.32 %.
  • 8 TGT for $ 65.00 per share and a yield of 3.69 %.
  • 6 ED for $ 75.66 per share and a yield of 3.65 %.
They all pay a quarterly dividend and these purchases will give me $ 14, $ 19.2  and $ 16.56 for at total amount of $ 49.76. My entire portfolio can be found here. If anyone has any tips on how to create a good way to keep track my portfolio please let me know.


Monday, January 23, 2017

Short term watch list

My salary will soon be available for investing so I'd better start planning which companies to invest in. I want to own companies that have a good track record of increasing dividend, i.e dividend kings/aristocrats. I want to diversify and one way of doing that is simply to buy two aristocrats in different sectors each month. I prefer not buying stocks with a yield lower than 3 %, so that will be my first criteria. Second is that I want to have a P/E ratio that is not to high. Third is that I want to have a positive "feeling" for the company. I know that's not rational, but I don't want to make investments I don't believe in.

This month I will choose from (ticker, yield, eps):

  • ED, 3.78, 18.03
  • TGT, 3.77, 11,72 
  • KO, 3.38, 25.16
  • MCD, 3.10, 22.67
  • PG, 3.08, 24.62

Do you have any thoughts or comments on my plans?

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Income/expense November 2016

As I wrote in my post Goals 2017 I've now made a summary of my income and expenses for November 2016. I will not write anymore about the past since it has already happened and you cannot change it. The future is everything!

Expenses: 11 110 SEK
Income: 30 710 SEK
Saving rate: 63.8 %

The expense are a bit skewed since the expenses reflect the actual cash flow on my account. This month I paid a larger quarterly cost. If I would have spread out that cost my savings rate would have been 68 %, which makes my estimate 65 % for 2016 more reasonable.

Monday, January 16, 2017

Income/expense December 2016

As I wrote in my post Goals 2017 I've now made a summary of my income and expenses for December 2016. I will follow up with November in a few days.

Expenses: 12 034 SEK
Income: 30 710 SEK
Saving rate: 60.8 %

The savings rate is quite a bit lower than what I've estimate for the full year, but December is also a the season to be jolly. These numbers are good to have as a reality check.

Sunday, January 15, 2017

Goals 2017

Goals are good but it's easy to be too ambitious and not to have SMART goals. I think that the most important quality of the criteria is to be Measurable and Time-bound. If you can't measure or know when they should be fulfilled goals are not really worth having.

I'm going to limit myself to these three goals:
  • 12 000 SEK in accumulated dividend income at the end of 2017.
  • 70 % saving rate.
  • Write at least one blog post per week.
The dividend goal is probably set a bit too high since I plan to invest 360 000 SEK and this means that my yield will have to be a lot higher than 3.33 %.

At the moment I have ~30 710 SEK after taxes and save ~20 0001 SEK each month for a savings rate around 65%. This means reducing my monthly expenses from ~10 710 SEK to ~9 213 SEK or increasing my income to ~35 700 SEK, or something in between. I think that it is reasonable for me to increase my salary after taxes to ~ 33 000 SEK which means I have to reduce my expense to ~9 900 SEK which will be a fun goal.

And last but not least the goal that is probably going to be by far the easiest or hardest. I have no experience writing a blog, but am hoping that it will be a fun and rewarding experience.

Thanks to Lauren Wayne for her tips on how to add footnote to blogger.


1 I don't really know how much money I spend every month. I will try to go back in time and summarize December and November

Thursday, January 12, 2017

First purchases

Now I've made my first purchases.
  • 20 SDIV for $ 21.22 per share and a dividend yield of 6.84 %
  • 30 SPFF for $ 13.01 per share and a dividend yield of  8.12 %
SDIV has a global exposure towards high yielding equities which feels as a good start in a diversified portfolio.

SPFF invests in the fifty highest yielding preferred stocks in North America.

Both SDIV and SPFF pay monthly dividend and will yield an estimate of $ 26.51 and $ 29.15 for a total of $ 55.66. 


Wednesday, January 11, 2017

Welcome world

This is going to be yet another blog about investments and the journey to financial independence. My plan is to invest in stocks that pay dividend with the hope that I'll be so successful that the dividends will exceed my expenses and eventually my salary. I'm hoping that this blog will be a help for me and that it will make me focus and have discipline when it comes to investments and my personal finances.

During 2017 I'm going to invest 30000 SEK (1 USD = 9.07185 SEK, I'm currently living in Sweden) where two-thirds comes from my salary and one-third from my previous savings.

I will try to make summary of all my current assets and expenses, but that will probably take some time. I've opened a new account at a broker where I'm going to be completely open with my assets.