March 2017 Dividends

March was kind of different for me because I decided to change some of my brokerage firms. When I first started investing I picked Sharebuilder because the interface was simple, fees were low, and they didn’t require a minimum investment. Now there are a lot more options for investing and I needed to start innovating my investment portfolio. The first part of that was to open a Robinhood account. I did that part a couple of years ago. The next part was to open a Charles Schwab account. Of course the question is why Charles Schwab? There are several reasons. First of all Sharebuilder a few years ago got bought out by Capital One. When they did that they got rid of a lot of the investor tools that used to be on the website. I preferred the old investor tools and find that the new tools with Capital One do not give me the information I need to make an investment decision. The second reason is due to the trading fee. With Capital One I paid $7.95 per trade and with Charles Schwab I pay $4.95 per trade. The last reason is the biggest reason I got a Charles Schwab account and it has to do with my new Charles Schwab debit card. The card is awesome. No fees ever. With my investment account I get a no fee interest bearing checking account. No fees for a checking account and they pay me for it! Go figure. Then it gets better because I get a Visa debit card with that account. Not just any Visa debit card, a completely no fee debit card. No fees for taking out money at any time! When I went to Japan and used my Wells Fargo card I got hit with so many fees. $2.50 by the atm, $3.00 for using a non-Wells Fargo atm, and a 3% money conversion fee. With Charles Schwab that is a thing of the past. So convenient.
To make that change I had to sell all my Sharebuilder stocks and then start to rebuy them on Charles Schwab. I probably didn’t make as much money as I could have but I still came out ahead so it was all good.

457K Account: $105.82
Robinhood Account: $84.01
AGNC (American Capital Agency Corp.) – $5.94
O – (Realty Income Corp.) – $3.37
ORC – (Orchid Capital Inc.) – $14.14
WMC – (Western Asset Mortgage Capital Corp.) – $7.13
WTR – (Aqua America Inc.) – $2.30
WFC – (Wells Fargo Co.) – $1.90
HCP – (HCP Inc.) – $7.40
FUN – (Cedar Park LP) – $1.71
EPR – (EPR Properties) – $.68
HSY – (Hershey Co.) $.62
DF – (Dean Foods Co.) – $2.70
FTR – (Frontier Communications Corp.) – $36.12

Sharebuilder Account: $2.55
UL – (Unilever) – $2.55

Charles Schwab: $0

Total March 2017 Dividends: $192.38

Shares Sold/Bought
O – (Realty Income Corp.) – Buy
GE – (General Electric Co.) – Buy
SPY – (SPDR S&P 500) – Buy


Comments

March 2017 Dividends — 2 Comments

  1. Looks like a solid performance for March. First time I see DF in a DGI portfolio. Nice to see a few companies in common paying us too. I’m still with Sharebuilder and plan to stay. It’s too bad about Loyal3 closing. My sister in law had an account there and it was perfect for her to start investing. Now we are looking to transfer to Robinhood though it will be harder to invest since they don’t offer fractional shares. Thanks for the update.

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