More Fun with Dick & Jane, Oh Hello OHI, Biden's Plans for Dividends

 Well the experiment with my Fidelity "Roth" 401k was a bust.  Because it is a 401k, and not an IRA, it is beholden to the withdrawal rules.  Therefore I quickly changed to a pre-tax 401k, still holding at 5% of my income to be matched by my employer.  After doing the math, and checking on an article by the "Mad Fientist" It still makes sense to take advantage of matching.  Even though I still think I could make more with my $100, the math shows that after early withdrawal penalties and taxes, my matched $100 would come out at $135.  This is assuming the ETFs that Fidelity uses do not increase or decrease over the next 3-4 years.  The key here is if you are married, you don't want to make more than 80k a year in retirement, otherwise you jump from 12% in taxes to 22%!  So I choose pre-tax now, withdraw enough after I retire each year to take me to 80k, then invest it.  It may take me awhile, I have quite a chunk in there (I wish it were otherwise).  For now, the pre-tax works.

Well, it is happening.  I am running out of good companies with good yields, and I am overbought on the companies that do.  However, after studying Justin Law's list of Dividend Contenders, Champions, and Aristocrats, I did find one... Omega Healthcare (OHI).  It is a REIT, and it caters to nursing homes, retirement homes, and senior living.  Some things about this REIT that caught my eye:

• They are funded mostly by Medicare and Medicaid (80-90%).  While this can be affected by politics, it won't the next 4+ years with Biden at the helm. 
• It survived the Pandemic.  Surprisingly, this management team not only survived, but recovered, and also took advantage to buy up other senior housing REIT units.  Impressive!  Also, Uncle Sam didn't stop payment during the pandemic either.  Seniors were affected the most, so this speak a lot to their management being on top of things.
• It has 16 years of increased dividends, so on its way to being an Aristocrat someday.
• Sports a 7%+ yield.
• It helps me spread out my weights.  I was overbought on some stocks, now I can buy more of them.  The only drawback is that REITs are now king in my portfolio, not consumer staples.  I will work on that, but right now consumer staples are highly priced due to success during the pandemic (yes, they are still cool).

I bought 2 lots this week.  Yep, my first time buying in "lots" (a bundle of 100 shares).  No waiting to be grouped with another lot as my purchases usually go, they were bought almost immediately.  They have their earnings next week, so we will see if I made a good call.  Now I have 29 stocks.  Only one to go, right Creed?

Biden announced a proposed increase in capital gains tax.  At first glance, I would say "so what, doesn't affect me.  I'm keeping my stocks forever.  Plus, I'm not even that rich."  Yeah, but what will the big money do?  They have nowhere else to put their cash, so they might just cash out their capital gains now, and put it into dividend stocks.  And what will that do???  Decrease yields.  When will the Dems learn that when you increase taxes on the big guys, it just hurts the little guy.  Like when they increase taxes on corporations, it only decreases headcount, increases automation, and leftover costs get passed right on to the consumer.  Biden Hood "Robbing the rich to give to the poor" does not work.  For now I will be watching carefully, and investing in higher yields assuming they will dry up.  If Biden was smart, he would raise returns in municipal bonds so the wall street bros will go there instead of dividend stocks.  Let's cross our fingers.

On the plus side, I hit another benchmark, now making 800+ a month on dividends ($825 actually).  That comes to $191 a week, $27 a day.  Over a dollar an hour!  Catching up to you Buffett!  :P  Close to making 10k a year... I should hit that in the next 1-2 months.

Dividend Increases & Special Payouts

• Procter & Gamble (NYSE:PG) declares $0.8698/share quarterly dividend, 10% increase from prior dividend of $0.7907 Fantastic increase from a consumer staple stock!  PG is kicking butt and taking names, but with increased production and transportation costs, and the reopening of the economy, this may be the peak for awhile.

• Southern CO (NYSE:SO) declares $0.66/share quarterly dividend, 3.1% increase from prior dividend of $0.64. I expect this to be better going forward, now that their nuclear plant is finished.  C'mon hot summers!
• Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) declares $1.06/share quarterly dividend, 5% increase from prior dividend of $1.01.  Despite Covid setbacks, JNJ takes a licking and keeps on ticking!
• Chevron (NYSE:CVX) declares $1.34/share quarterly dividend, 3.9% increase from prior dividend of $1.29.  I expect Chevron & AT&T to benefit from the "Rich Rotation".  I see better raises in the future.

April Purchases: