2019 October Dividend Summary

Market has been on a bit of a tear lately hitting new records highs in the past week.  Many of the stocks that I had been hoping to build as they hung out near their 52 week lows have seen a jump in their valuations along with the rest of the market as a whole.  Stocks like CVS, CAH, MMM and many of the banks recovered nicely and from a strictly valuation perspective, and may have plenty of more room to run in the near term.  As much as I hate to admit it, it is sometimes difficult to average up even when the current valuation of a company, although higher than what my current cost basis may be, is still below what I believe is a rough estimate of the company's intrinsic value.  CVS and DAL are probably both good examples of scenario as it relates to the PIV portfolio.  In any event, dividends continue roll in and cash in the PIV accounts is building much faster than I am choosing to invest in recent months.  See below for October's dividend summary.

October's net increase of 9.5% isn't as much of a jump in YoY income as the PIV portfolio has experienced in recent months, considering that the YTD increase in dividend income sits at 23.5%.  As noted above the YoY rate variance is unfavorable by (1.7%), a sight no one wants to see ever, let alone on a regular basis.  Fortunately, I don't anticipate this being a regularly reportable event for the portfolio.  It is no surprise that this unfavorable variance is directly attributed to the portfolio's GE holding and after a second year of dividend cuts, the next step would be to cut the dividend altogether, but GE management doesn't seem inclined to do that at the moment.  With respect to volume changes, the favorable variance of $47.49 was driven by purchases of both CAH, LEG, and AVGO and partially offset by the impact of the resulting from the FOXA reorganization which was a result of the transaction with DIS earlier this year.  Looking forward to November and December, both months will reflect stronger results than October and the portfolio should finish off the year with > 20% YoY dividend income.  Stay tuned!