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April 2016 trading, investing, and dividends results

April 2016 was a positive month to me. Both account – trading account and my ROTH IRA dividend account grew well and nice.

Surprisingly nice! There are a few patterns I start seeing which makes me happy.

I hope, that it will stay like this in the coming month although last day of trading in Wall Street put a little blow to my trading account.

Nevertheless, my options trading account ended up 32.60% in April and I made collected $938.00 dollars in premiums.

My dividend investing was slower than that (but I do not expect any fast and huge profits) yet it ended up by amazing 7.96% and I collected nice $84.49 dollars in dividends.

I also do options trading in my ROTH account and I collected additional $90 dollars premium.

Let’s take a look at the details!


 


 
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 · April 2016 trading results

April trading ended great with nice profits. I traded options against dividend stocks and I traded aggressively selling ATM puts collecting premiums. This aggressive trading put a few stocks in a heat.

I accepted assignment of Ensco (ESV). I didn’t have to and I could roll the option, but I wanted to accept it and keep the stock and trade against it. I continue selling puts and covered calls. Hopefuly, I will also collect dividends.

The biggest heat I got was from STX. What at first looked like a good trade ended bad. First, the company lowered its outlook and the stock tanked making my puts in the money. Then it started recovering and you could see the short selling squeeze. The stock rallied and I decided to cover my naked calls by buying shares of the stock.

I also sold a few more puts. Then earnings blew the stock out of the water and it tanked 20%. Another over-reaction from the market. I think we need to get used to it that investors and traders will react like this. It will be a reaction from one extreme to another.

But the most important thing is, that if something like this happen a trader must know what to do and not to panic. Always have a plan. Always have a plan for every situation in the market. Always know what steps you want to take to mitigate the loss or eliminate it.

To my STX trade such plan is to stay the course, roll the puts lower and continue selling more calls and puts. I opened my first trade at 33 strike. I could lower it down to 32 strike and I plan lowering it more down to 31, 30, and so on. And if I get assigned early, I’ll take the stock, keep it, collect dividends, and continue selling covered calls.

 

Here is my trading result for the month:

 

April 2016 options trading income: $938.00 (36.93%)
2016 portfolio Net-Liq: $3,039.46 (32.60%)
2016 portfolio Cash Value: $429.69 (-87.47%)
2016 overall trading account result: 19.68%

 

My cash value dropped because of purchasing equity. I was assigned to ESV and purchased STX this month. That’s what the cash was used for.

Here are the results of my options trading:

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
Here are the results of my options strategy:

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

The table above shows a good strike of winning trades in the first quarter. I hope my next quarter will be as good as the last one.

My average trade holding time is currently 19 days, average P/L 3.11% and 111.27% annualized return.

Not bad results for only two months of trading after I returned back to this strategy.

I knew trading SPX spreads wasn’t for me and I should have stayed with my original strategy (this strategy) in the first place. I could have been a lot further ahead, closer to my retirement. But we are human, we make mistakes and we are here to correct them, start over, and move on.

 
Here are results of the individual trades:

 
PSEC

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
ESV

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
ABBV

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
LULU

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
KMI

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
TRGP

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)

 
COP

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

 
ETE

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

 
MOS

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

 
PSX

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

 
STX

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

If you like these trades and want to be informed when I place them and trade them in real time, you can join our closed Facebook Group. The group is a closed group and there are other traders posting their trade ideas too. We learn from each other, eventually ask questions, get answers, but most importantly you can see what we trade and how. You can follow those trades.

 
Here is the entire account value from the beginning of tracking it up to today:

TD Account Value
 

 

 


 
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 · April 2016 dividend investing results

After dividend cuts my portfolio stabilized and is steadily growing again. I liked a lot seeing my DRIP purchasing, seeing that I am purchasing more and more shares and those shares are producing more and more dividends every month.

Just recently I was looking at some of my holdings and I saw them bringing in more dividends. It is most visible in monthly paying stocks that every month I get slightly more dividends. And I can see this process speeding up significantly.

What do you think?

To me, this is very motivating to continue building my dividend portfolio although I am more into options rather than being passive, working hard, putting money into my account and waiting.

I want options trading doing this job. I want to trade options, take all proceeds and invest them into dividend stocks. Then I do not have to work hard skip vacations because I am saving money.

I am lazy, and I want my money not to be lazy.

For this reason I created three sub-accounts in my ROTH account.

Those accounts are mental accounts. Physically they do not exist.

I keep it only in my spreadsheet and keep track of it.

So I created a “fund” of a “great opportunity”, a fund for “options trading” and a “stock purchase” fund. As of now, I plan to keep $2,000 for trading options (and slowly increasing this “account”, $1,000 dollars for great opportunity (if any good stock suffers from an irrational selloff, I want to have some cash ready for this event), and stock purchasing “account” will be an account which I will use to buy stocks out right. Once filled with cash, I use it right away to buy a stock of my interest and then continue saving new money.

And guess which account would make money for those two other accounts?

You got it, it is my options trading account. Here is a picture of my ROTH IRA account spreadsheet I keep track of these sub-accounts. Now I am in a re-filling or building those sub-accounts:

 

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

As you can see, my “options trading account” is almost funded. Once funded, I will continue trading options using this money, but all proceeds will be allocated into “great opportunity” fund. After that fund is funded, I will be allocating all proceeds and savings to “stock purchasing fund”.

I will also be increasing goals in those funds as my options trading will be growing.

 

Options Income
(Click to enlarge)
 

My annual dividend income this month is up from $887.98 to $897.17.

Dividend stocks added or removed from portfolio:

 

April 2016 dividend stock buys: none
April 2016 dividend stock sells: none

 

To purchase stocks I use trailing stock order strategy OTO trade order (one triggers other) and I described this strategy in my post about purchasing stocks in falling markets.

I also invest into dividend paying stocks using Motif investing which allows me to buy all 30 stocks I want in one purchase using fractional investing, similar to a mutual fund.

You can actually build your own mutual fund with Motif investing.

Here is my Motif Investing account you can review:
 
 

 

 
 

I continue reinvesting my dividends using DRIP program. I love how my holdings grow when reinvesting the dividends and when the stock prices are going lower. As I believe we are heading into a recession I will be able buying more shares for a lot cheaper.

 

Dividend stocks DRIP:

 

April 2016 DRIP: Reynolds American Inc. (RAI)
PPL Corporation (PPL)
American Capital Agency Corp. (AGNC)
Realty Income Corporation (O)
Prospect Capital Corporation (PSEC)

 

Here are my ROTH IRA trading/investing results:

 

April 2016 dividend income: $84.49
April 2016 options income: $90.00
2016 portfolio value: $19,156.99 (7.96%)
2016 overall dividend account result: 26.53%

 

The account grew by 7.96% from last month, overall I am up 26.53%. Dividend income was also up from last month. All dividends were reinvested back to the companies which generated them.

 
Here is my dividend income:

ROTH IRA account value
 

 
Annual dividends since the beginning:

ROTH IRA account value
 

Here is the entire account value from the beginning of tracking it up to today:

ROTH IRA account value

 

 


 
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Below is my dividend income review for the entire year:

Dividend Income
My ROTH IRA dividend income breakdown per month and per company.
 
 

 · All accounts

Besides trading and dividend accounts I also have 401k account, emergency savings account, etc., which I do not report in detail. You can review those accounts in my “All Accounts Value” table at the bottom of My Trades & Income page.

My accounts increased from previous month and are making 16.58% (up 5.69% from previous month) for the year.

Remember, if you like trading options and want to have trade ideas for free, join my Facebook closed group and follow my put selling trade ideas in real time, comment, ask questions, and interact with other members. Other members of the group can also post their trades so you can learn from them too.

 
 

You can join the options trading group here

 
 

What do you think?

How about your investing or trading results?

Do you have any question? Need help to start trading or investing? Shoot me an email or let me know below in comments how I can help you.

 
 





7 responses to “April 2016 trading, investing, and dividends results”

  1. DivHut says:

    Looks like a really good month for options premiums. Last month you seemed to be making great trades on that front. Add some dividend income and you really hit it out of the park with your passive income. No exciting options trades for me, just plain old dividend rolling in last month. I’ll take it as long as I can post year over year gains. Thank you for sharing.

  2. easydividend says:

    really good work here.

    You know I have some position in STX too. I sold another Put till december and bought 100 shares at 27, because it looked like the call at 28 was in danger.

    So, i have now two PUTs, one expires this friday. I am afraid I have to buy the shares above 31 dollar.

    then I own 200 shares from STX. I will collect diviends and hope to get rid of the shares in the future.

    best regards

    • Martin says:

      I have a similar situation. I have a few puts and I had a call contract and bought 100 shares to cover that call. I think I was too quick on it, but better quick than late and end up with a loss.

      Thanks for stopping by.

  3. Nice work collecting options premiums. Nearly $1,000 in a month is a fantastic number to hit.

    • Martin says:

      Yes, April was a good month. May started quite gloomy with a large unrealized loss, so in order to preserve cash, I am trading less a bit now, so May may be not as good as April. We will see in 30 days or so.

  4. amber tree says:

    Good to hear that you have found back again an option trading strategy that fits your personality and that brings you profit!

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