Monthly Update: July 2014

Portfolio Acitivities
$1,500 deposited into the Investing Account
Sold MDT @ $63.45
Sold COP @ $84.20
Sold POT @ $36.11
Sold KO @ $39.50
Bought 14.9726 shares of ROST @ $66.52
Bought 10 shares of RKT @ $103.10
$450 deposited into Lending Club

Portfolio Income
Dividends ($105.52)
     AFSI: $2.31
     CIG: $66.55
     KO: $3.69
     MDT: $1.63
     ARCP: $6.35
     PSEC: $11.93
     NDRO: $2.35
     BLV: $2.69
     JNK: 4.65
     PCY: $1.99
     Interest from Cash: $1.38
Lending Club
     Interest: $31.35
Rental Income
     Townhouse 1: $950

Switching to a Total Return Strategy: I know this is sacrilegious in the dividend growth investing community but I am focusing on total returns these days. Lending Club is giving enough income to allow me to move into some positions that have lower yield but higher returns. So far this year it is working very well for me as I have 8.17% return vs S&P is at 5.01%
This is with a 5.01% forward yield on the portfolio with 28.5% cash.
Due to the massive deposits I am doing this year I am not posting or trumpeting my horn with the total return numbers as its a bit skewed with deposits.
At the end of the day though I am still an income guy. The capital gains are intended to buy more income producing assets.

Lots of activity: Lot of selling occurred this month as many of my stops were hit. Is this the beginning of the correction in equities everyone has been expecting? Who knows. All I did was look at what was overvalued and put stops on them. 
I don't like to be this cash heavy but with whats going on in Ukraine and Iraq I'm not exactly eager to deploy capital. Even with this cash heavy a position I am on pace to hitting my income goal for 2014.

Record Income: For the second month in a row I have hit a new record for income thanks mostly to CIG paying their annual dividend. I still would have done better then previous quarter but the January/April/July/October months are always my lowest.

Market seems to be aged: Its not like I am purposefully avoiding the standard dividend income positions. Its that they seem overvalued. Lots of them have hit high valuations over their own historic P/E ratios.
I don't know about anyone else but I am finding it hard to find many undervalued positions to deploy cash to. 

Anyone else out there finding it hard to deploy cash or is your style more finding whatever is cheapest on your watch list and deploying it asap?

Disclaimer: The investments and trades discussed are not recommendations for others. I am not a financial planner, financial adviser, accountant, or tax adviser. The financial actions I talk about are for my own portfolio and money and only suited for my own risk tolerance, strategy, and ideas. Copying another person's financial moves can lead to large losses. Each person needs to do their due diligence in researching and planning their own actions in the financial markets.