Dividend Growth Portfolio, March 2014 Update

2014 has certainly been an interesting year so far. Thus far, as Q1 is coming to an end, TSX has been outperforming the S&P 500 to the tune of 5%. But wait, all performance is not the same. Since January 1, CAD has depreciated some 6% against the USD. Each Canadian Dollar only buys 0.893 US Dollar now. What does this mean for Canadian investors?

• higher cost of imported retail goods
• higher cost of fuel
• higher cost to invest in US equities & other US dollar denominated assets
• higher cost of cross-border shopping
• paper gains on US dollar assets

Perhaps this is a good time to convert some USD back to our monopoly money (trust me you'll miss having color coded money if you live in the US long enough!) 

New Purchases 

($ amount represents expected dividends in the next 12 months from new shares)

• Philip Morris: purchased 25 additional shares of $PM. Currently pays a quarterly dividend of 94 cents, which adds $94 to my annual dividend received

• Rogers Communications: purchased 50 additional shares of $RCI.CA. Currently pays a quarterly dividend of 45.75 cents, which adds $91.50 to my annual dividend received

Sales

• Boeing: sold 15 shares of $BA. At current quarterly dividend of 73 cents, this represents a decrease of $43.80 from my annual dividend received

Intrinsic Dividend Changes

• CN: $CNR.CA hiked its quarterly dividend 16% from 21.5 cents to 25 cents
• Rogers: $RCI.CA raised its quarterly dividend 5.2% from 43.5 cents to 45.75 cents
• Coca Cola: $KO boosted its quarterly dividend 8.9% from 28 cents to 30.5 cents
• HCP: $HCP raised its quarterly dividend 3.8% from 52.5 cents to 54.5 cents
• General Dynamics: $GD hiked its quarterly dividend 10.7% from 56 cents to 62 cents
• Bank of Nova Scotia: $BNS.CA raised its quarterly dividend 3.2%* from 62 cents to 64 cents
• Toronto Dominion Bank: $TD.CA raised its quarterly dividend 9.3%** from 43 cents to 47 cents (split adjusted)

*Canadian banks typically raise the dividend semi-annually

**TD commented they may not have a 2nd dividend hike this year and instead did one big hike

Summary

• December 2013 Annualized Dividend: $5933.73
• March 2014 Annualized Dividend: $6251.51
• End of 2014 Goal: $6900 to $7300

• YTD Dividends Received: $1352
• 2014 Dividends Received Goal: $6100

• YTD Intrinsic Dividend Growth: 3.83%
• YTD Dividend Growth from New Funds and/or Re-balancing : 3.30%

This marks the 13th consecutive quarter of increasing income from dividends since I started keeping track in March 2011! It has been a slow process but hard work and persistence really pays off!