Each month at How to Invest HQ, I post the trades I have made over the last month as well as my overall portfolio performance over the past month. Doing this allows me to analyze what I did wrong and right and helps shape my investing plan over the coming months.
Trades Made During March 2012
- 3/1/2012: Bought Solar Capital Ltd. (NASDAQ:SLRC) at $23.10.
- 3/8/2012: Bought McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) at 97.01.
- 3/22/2012: Bought SLRC @ 22.05. After averaging the amount I paid for each share, this averages to $22.56 per share.
- 3/30/2012: Dividend from Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE:WFC) automatically reinvested into my holdings in WFC.
Transaction Summary
Most of the month, I kept most of my holdings. I added a lot more cash to my portfolio this month, increasing the cash I have invested by 40%.
Since most of my stocks have been on a run this year, I ended up sticking this money in SLRC while I wait for my primary 5 stocks to pull back. At the price I paid for it, SLRC pays around a 2.6% quarterly dividend which I think is safe for at least the next quarter. I plan on selling SLRC and adding more money to my current positions in the event of a pullback.
How to Invest HQ Portfolio Performance: March 2012
In the month of March, the net value of my portfolio increased by 3.05%. This is above the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s gain of 2.01% and slightly below the S&P 500′s gain of 3.13%. Below, I will take a look at my major winners and losers over the past month.
The Good: AAPL, WFC, T, MCD
Overall, the bulk of my original investments performed really well in March. Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) was up 10.53% in March and WFC was up 9.11%. AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) also had a good month, moving up 2.09%. While that 2.09% move might not seem like much, you have to remember that AT&T has nearly a 6% annual dividend.
MCD gained a modest ~1% from where I bought it. I think it would have done much better if their long-running CEO did not retire this month. Temporary worries about leadership kicked the stock down a few percent from where I bought it, but it has since gone up and I think it will continue to do so over the coming months.
The Not So Good: COP, SLRC
While I had 3 stocks that did great, I had three other ones whose lack of movement reduced my overall return in the market. None of these stocks performed particularly poorly, but none of them did really well either.
ConocoPhillips (NYSE: COP) dropped .71% over the course of the month, but that was due to the fact that the price of light crude fell over 5% from the beginning of March to the end of the month. With projected increases in the price of oil in the future and the imminent splitting of the company, I think ConocoPhillips will rebound strongly in the next quarter, particularly if oil prices go up.
SLRC is not a stock I plan to hold for any length of time. I am simply holding my excess capital here since they pay a big dividend until one of my other 5 stocks pulls back, at which point I will sell the SLRC and move into my other positions.
Since my SLRC position did not really make any money this month (its about even, perhaps down a fraction of a percent when you include the dividend), my overall portfolio stayed in line with the market
How to Invest HQ Portfolio Performance Summary
Over the month of March, I posted a 3.05% gain, whereas the Dow posted a 2.01% gain and the S&P 500 increased by 3.13%. I had two nice gains in Apple and Wells Fargo, but overall I did not beat the S&P 500 since I increased the initial base investments by 40% this month, putting the money into SLRC, which has not moved yet.
Over the next few months, I plan to distribute that money amongst my 5 primary stocks (and possibly add more cash as well) as I think this will lead to solid returns. Right now the money is sitting in SLRC until I get a pullback worthy of investment.