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Strategies & Market Trends : Dividend investing for retirement -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Triffin who wrote (10641)	12/27/2011 1:51:31 PM
From: Ditchdigger	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 34328

While not stock nor dividend specific, I am shifting funds within Vanguard towards mid and small cap index growth. This is a contrarian play against the markets dividend enthusiasm, call it a hedge of sorts . ditch

To: Triffin who wrote (10641)	12/27/2011 4:22:51 PM
From: chowder	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 34328

I'm not changing anything. So far everything is working fine for me. Dividend income is up. Total return is up. Nearly every company I own increased dividends, not one has lowered them. Going forward, my main concern is FTR and CTL. I'm going to remain patient. I have several mergers that will affect my portfolio, so I may have to do something later with regard to that. COP, ABT, NST, SDRL and PGN are all dealing with mergers or splitting part of the company. Late in the first quarter, I'll be able to move additional funds from a 401K into a traditional IRA. I plan on purchasing KMI, increasing my position in a couple of utilities, and maybe add another utility. My strongest performing company is a spec position in MHR. I'm up 740% on that one. I don't have any plans to sell in the near future. I bought it at 64 cents, now selling for $5.47 and I intend to hold it until it gets into the low teens. That's the plan anyway. Other than that, KMR is now my best performing dividend company since I sold EPB. I bought KMR in Nov 08 and am now up 112% on that one. I'm not selling a single unit. I'm going to let that one continue doing what it's been doing. Next week I'll produce the results of the Project $3 Million Portfolio. So far, it's impressive.

To: Triffin who wrote (10641)	12/29/2011 9:25:30 AM
From: Bread Upon The Water	Respond to of 34328

Although hedging, which I also am doing, is not dividend investing, I look at it as the thing that lets me stay invested (in the dividend stocks) regardless of what temporary swoons Mr Market is in or what unforeseen tsunami is rushing toward our economic shores. Its more of a personal preference based on my age and risk tolerance. If one can tolerate a 50% fall off in one's capital and still sleep at nite then there is no need to hedge as it does have its costs also (the amount in the hedge is not paying dividends--although it may prpovide a large long term capital gain if the market falls off a cliff). One of my recent investment readings were the long term tables (40 years) provided by Seattle based investor/advisor Paul Merriman in his book "Financial Fitness Forever" (McGraw Hill $25 [MHPROFESSIONAL.COM]). 100k over 40 years (1970--2010) in a 60% stocks in the S&P 500 and 40% bonds (All government fixed income consisting of 50% intermediate term, 30% short term, and 20% TIPS) produced a return of 9.6% or $4, 272,000. Splitting the 60% equity part into 5 12% components consisting of: REITS, US Small value, US Mircro Cap, US large value, and S&P 500 produced a return of 11% over the same 40 years for a return of $7,234,000. While 1.4 percent difference in return doesn't sound like much the effect in actual dollars was around a 2.9 million dollar difference. While most of us nearing or in retirement probably can't count on another 40 years 30 isn't out of the question (the fastest growing segment of the population is the over 90 crowd). So the lesson I take I away from this is that some of one's portfolio (10-15%?) probably should contain 4 of the 5 elements on the equity side that are not in the S&P 500 in terms of having the potential to give one's funds a percentage jolt as one ages. Of course, if the dividend growth is outstripping inflation and provides enough of a cushion in retirement to let some of the dividends "ride" for a while there is probably no need to consider the "jolt" part of the equation. It all depends on ones individual circumstances.

To: Triffin who wrote (10641)	12/29/2011 7:03:28 PM
From: chowder	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 34328

Triff, I think I have changed my mind about making changes within my portfolio. I have been waiting on a couple of mergers within my utility holdings. PGN is supposed to go with DUK. ... NST is supposed to go with NU, and that transaction is past due. The yield on PGN is now down to 1.9% That is unacceptable for a utility and it's because I have some very nice capital gains in it. A special dividend is due on 1/9. If the deal with DUK doesn't materialize by then, I will sell PGN and find another utility. NST pays their special dividend on 1/3. The yield on NU is under 4%, so that is unacceptable as well. I think I will sell NST after 1/3 and move those proceeds into NGG, a company I was wanting to add to anyway, and it is yielding 4.5%. My initial yield with NGG was above 6%, sheesh. There won't be any tax consequences on these two assumable sales as they are located within a traditional IRA. I'm still wanting to add another utility in 2012 and AEP is a possibility. If I sell PGN, I'll have to add another one as well, making it two utility companies I need to find. The above plan is not written in stone. I'm still in the thought decision process and have a couple of weeks to decide. I will check out Value Line after the New Year to determine what my final choices will be.