Somethings Old

Some Trades this week included new, old and income solutions.

This past week was full of good opportunities because some investors got nervous. My shares of APAM had been called away, so I bought another 100 shares on the price dip. In addition, I was able to add to my holdings in the following companies: ANTM, IBM, ILPT, HBAN, and ETF VYM. I love weeks when the market gets silly. By the way, IBM is called “Blue” so this is also something blue for the “Something Olde, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue” saying.

Somethings New

This week SYF (SYNCHRONY FINANCIAL) shares dropped. I have been watching SYF, so I bought 100 shares. The P/E for this company is just ridiculously low and the dividend picture is attractive. I also bought shares of DOW when the price dropped to a low that seems to be repeating. DOW has a wonderful dividend yield, and the Ex-Dividend date is May 27, so I will keep this position and collect the dividends. The third “something new” was STK. This is a technology position that you would think would have a low dividend yield. However, because of the way the managers trade options, the income is far more than you would typically receive when investing in tech stocks.

STK is Columbia Seligman Premium Technology Growth Fund

The holdings in STK are the who’s who of tech. They include: Lam Research Corporation, Apple, Teradyne, Applied Materials, Broadcom, Synaptics, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, and Synopsis. This is, however, a CEF – a closed end fund. The fund is a closed ended equity mutual fund launched and managed by Columbia Management Investment Advisers, LLC. It invests in public equity markets. The fund seeks to invest in stocks of companies operating in the technology sector. It primarily invests in growth stocks of companies. It employs fundamental analysis with focus on factors like companies that have best growth prospects, trade at attractive valuations, and deliver solid investment returns over time to create its portfolio. STK sells call options on its portfolio to generate extra income, which it hands to investors in the form of its decent dividend.

More Income Too

Covered Calls are a great way to earn more income. I have continued to trade covered calls on my ETN (Eaton) shares and have received $921 in income from that aspect of this investment. That doesn’t include the dividends I receive. So far in 2021 I have received $380 in dividends so my total income from ETN is now over $1,000 in the first four months of the year.

The $921 income is from trading covered calls.

Summary

Most of my readers probably don’t want to trade options. However, you might want to consider adding a CEF like STK to your investment mix. DOW is also worthy of consideration.

Full Disclosure

Cindie and I own 200 shares of STK as a long-term investment. I own 100 shares of DOW and 100 shares of APAM. However, our largest holding, by far, is ETF VYM. We own more than 2,100 shares of this good dividend growth ETF.