Dividend re-investment time with additional 25 shares of Bristol-Myers Squibb bought for 51,60 USD per share. Original goal was to build a modest position of 100 shares and that has now been completed. Might still slowly increase the position together with Pfizer and Medtronic positions but that remains to be seen. All of these are likely funded with dividends only unless there’s significant market correction.
Q3/2024 Results
Third quarter is over and performance has been surprisingly good considering the mess we are in. US elections are approaching, middle east is middle easting and Finnish economy is performing consistently – pretty badly but consistently. Considering everything stocks have performed incredibly well. My main focus is on dividend income which does not fluctuate with stock prices, therefore there weren’t any major surprises. Dividend income during the quarter was 1527,64 EUR before taxes and when converted to euros at the time writing. Fourth quarter will be interesting one and personally I see potential for significant correction. Not that it matters much as I intend to buy consistently mainly focusing on dividend reinvestments and small injections of fresh capital. Otherwise I’ll let cash position to build up until we either see a major correction or cash position reaches maximum size.
Recent Buy: Kesko Oyj (B series)
Once again a boring maintenance purchase in the form of 20 shares of Kesko Oyj (B series) bought for 18,365 EUR per share. There’s not much to say about this as everything has been said before with similar purchases. Slightly disappointing that I seem to have missed the boat on the cheaper valuations but let’s see what happens in coming months. I’ll likely nibble my way up to 300 shares unless valuation shoots up unexpectedly.
Recent Buy: Kesko Oyj
Maintenance purchase time with yet another tiny addition on Kesko Oyj with 10 shares bought for 16.7 EUR per share . Same old story of hopefully temporary headwinds not originating from company itself.
Recent Buy: Bristol-Myers Squibb
Dividend reinvestment time with a third trench of Bristol-Myers Squibb. I bought additional 25 shares for 40.74 USD per share and will likely make one more similar purchase in coming months. Nothing special here as I have been building a small/medium sized position on the company as a part of basket of pharma stocks. I will likely also add on Medtronic during the second half but let’s see what happens.
Q2/2024 & H1/2024 Results
Seconds quarter and first half of 2024 is over. Once again it was filled with many sources of déjà vu as many of the critical contributors for world economy are the same old ones. War in Ukraine is still there, US elections with geriatric battle between Biden and Trump, tensions with China and Israel’s situation in general. Perhaps it’s a positive thing that the market has provided only similar déjà vu feelings since the alternative probably wouldn’t be a good one. Main dividend portfolio value increased by 2,80% during the quarter and 2,95% during first half. Dividend income for the first half was 7591,73 EUR and 6072,43 EUR for the second quarter (before taxes when converted to Euros at the time of writing). Nothing special there.
Second half might be interesting as said tensions have potential to escalate. Especially US elections will be interesting since they don’t exactly have two good candidates and tide is about to shift with democrats and Biden. Apparently first public debate was a disaster for Biden – I haven’t watched the whole things, only parts – and even the tone of mainstream media has shifted quickly. Trump winning seems quite likely but let’s see how things unfold. Personally I think that Trump’s second term would be something we as a whole could get through. Get through without significant pain and adaptation? Maybe not but likely with only reasonable bruising. I don’t see a need for any huge changes in my current approach for remaining two quarters. I’ll most likely focus on re-investing dividends with perhaps some limited injections of new cash. I’ll let cash reserves to increase since those will depleted by investments on physical assets (read: renovations).
Recent Buy: Nordea Bank Abp
Wasn’t really planning on buying Nordea at these levels but had dividends to reinvest and therefore had an opportunity to buy additional 100 shares of Nordea for 11,18 EUR per share. This rounds up the position to even number of 2000 shares. Nordea seems to be executing really well. Sector itself is always a bit problematic which shows in the overall sector valuation. Probably there is no huge upside potential in share price but I would be reasonably happy if Nordea can perform roughly the same way they have done last couple of years. Pure dividend play and share price appreciation will be just a bonus.
Recent Buy: Kesko Oyj (B series)
I was waiting for Kesko shares to trade around 16 EUR per share which they did. I got greedy and tried to buy some for 15,50 EUR per share. Almost did but almost doesn’t count. Had to give up with that and bought additional 50 shares for 16,19 EUR per share instead. Not a big deal but will keep an eye on this in coming weeks and months as might still add at least additional 100 shares. Valuation seems to be very favourable when looking few years ahead. Effectively this is a play on construction sector without having to own construction companies. That is a cycle which has to be at least close to bottoming out and hopefully will eventually bounce back even in Finland.
Recent Buy: Pfizer Inc.
This is complicated one but I decided to buy additional 30 shares of Pfizer Inc. for 25,78 USD per share. Pfizer has been dropping for awfully long period of time. In a way for a good reasons but personally I see current valuation as a somewhat significant overreaction. There are real challenges with portfolio and potential for legal issues especially from the COVID-19 vaccines. Portfolio problems are hopefully short-term issues and vaccine related contracts should guard the company reasonably well. Latter is naturally just speculation as reality will set in only after someone tests those in court. My thesis is quite simple: Pfizer is still one of the big dogs and I prefer to buy pharmaceuticals when they are down due to patent cliff or for whatever reason that is typical for the sector. Each one of such positions is relatively small and I think of these as a basket of pharma stocks. For now Pfizer smells a bit of a yield trap as current yield is about 6,4% but let’s see how this plays out. Hopefully yield will drop towards historical average as valuation improves.
Recent Buy: Kesko Oyj (B series)
Dividend re-investment done in advance as this is effectively re-investing remaining dividends from Fortum and some that will be paid next week (CapMan and Kesko). Nothing special here as the thesis is same: I’ll just slowly nibble on Kesko unless I see valuations closer to 16 EUR per share. This time around I nibbled 20 additional shares for 16,99 EUR per share.