Hi Everyone,
Oh my oh my, where to begin...
First things first I suppose - I'm sorry for such a long hiatus. Life has been insane. But, for some reason after the year we have all experienced, I decided to dust off the old blog, and write to you all again. After the arduous process of trying to remember my log in credentials (they were tied to an old college email that I haven't used in years) I started to read back through the old posts. To my delight, it was a joy to read them. It brought back both fond and not so fond memories of decisions and challenges as the months and years rolled on. It made me realize that this blog is not so much about making an impact on the world but more so an outlet for my thoughts and feelings at the time. A public journal if you will.
When I started this blog, I'll be honest, I was in it for the money. Posting dividend income for the public to read was a huge hit at the time and I was trying to capitalize on that trend. As all bloggers point out, making money is hard in this online world with just simple words on a page. It takes time and commitment, both of which are ever so challenging with the life I live.
So what about this life I live? Where have I been the past 2 years and what is going on now?
My last post was February 2019. Almost 2 full years have passed. Some of my last posts talked about the joys of being a father, of course the market and adoption costs/challenges.
Well, the joys of being a father are still alive and well. The one big change since last post - we adopted again! During one of the last posts, I wrote that the birth parents had wanted to parent their child the second time around - but that never happened. We adopted our first sons full biological brother! The boys just turned 3 & 2 this past year and they are best buddies! We still have an open relationship with the birth family and things are going well. I love being a father.
Since January 2019, we went to Hawaii for 15 days, had two; week long beach vacations, remodeled our kitchen, our master bathroom, re-plumbed the whole house, installed a new HVAC system and generally lived our best lives. With all the adoption expenses, vacations (Hawaii all expenses paid was only $2,500 for a family of 4 - only 2 plane tickets though - but I was pumped with that!), remodeling, and no real general concern for money the past 2 years, our savings rate has taken a drastic hit with only one income. As such, our accounts have not really moved much. I'm certainly frustrated in that regard and frustrated with some market moves I made but generally I am very happy. Life is a journey and the past 2 years have certainly shown that you can do all the planning in the world but sometimes its just not enough. Things happen.
My CVS position is now over 1000 shares through dividend reinvesting
My MO position is now over 1300 shares - through big purchases and dividend reinvesting
My BMY and V positions round out the 4 biggest positions I have.
I sold all of my FB - poor market move on my part.
I sold out part of my 401K stock mutual fund and moved into bonds - real poor market move
I bought at the very low during March 2020 with extra money from my HSA - really good market move, however with much less money than the 401K move so its still at a general loss.
I am overall just so confused with the market right now. I can understand that interest rates are so low that people need to invest in the market for growth but my god - tech stocks up over 40 PEs, airlines should be bankrupt, restaurants and REITS are still overpriced, 2022 growth has been pulled forward to 2020, its just unreal the market is as high as it is. But, I suppose when you shut down all the mom and pop shops, the only companies making good money are those that are listed on the markets. Furthermore, with all of the governments in the world doling out huge sums of money, its inevitable that it works its way back into stock prices. Its just such a conundrum right now. So, that's why I'm invested heavily in what I believe some of the cheapest stocks in the market right now. CVS is still raking in the money but the stock price has not moved in basically 4 years. MO is dirt cheap on a PE basis, still raking in the money, JUUL has basically been written down to $0, and the dividend pays handsomely. BMY is still digesting the CELG merger but is making huge non-GAAP profit (I know not the best) has a massive pipeline and pays a solid dividend.
I'm basically just looking for a market rotation at this point into value stocks. If/when that happens and these 3 stocks revert back to the mean, my accounts should explode upwards. But until then, over $6,000 in dividends are hitting the account every year. Its crazy to think but all of these stocks could realistically double or even triple over the course of the next year or two and still be cheap when compared to the S&P PE ratio (37) right now.
I am certainly kicking myself however for not just investing in tech stocks, then buying all of these value stocks right now. Ugh, so is life of a stock investor I suppose. Hindsight is always 20/20. Maybe one day I'll finally figure it out!
