Time to settle down with a nice well-brewed drink (tea, coffee, beer...whatever your fancy) and maybe a biscuit, cake or two and catch up with what has been published during the week related to financial independence, early retirement, frugality and personal finance more generally (with a little of other bits and pieces thrown in).
As usual, last week's post pulled in a mighty amount of interest from you all. Hopefully there is plenty in here to catch your interest again.
As always, this is going to include your favourite articles "On Here" (that is on The Dividend Drive) and my favourite articles "Over There" (that is, on other personal finance sites I read).
And "Over To You"? Well that is an invite for you to highlight any articles you came across that you found interesting and not included in the list below.
Anyway, here goes my list for 20 June. Enjoy!
PS: If you want to look at the archive of previous weekly round-up articles then head over to my Every(ish) Posts page. Here you will find all the articles (except portfolio purchase-related ones) published on the Dividend Drive as well as every weekly round-up to date. Take a look.
"On Here"
NOTE: The "On Here" list is purely quantitative. It is the posts with the most unique reads that week (not including other weekly round-up lists). Here's a little legend for you to explain the symbols: ★ = newly published; ▲ = moved-up list since last week; ▼ = moved down list since last week; ▬ = same place as last week.Again this week has seen the newly published articles--as usual--take the top spots. This time my little breakdown of master-investor, Neil Woodford, and his various trades last month. Also, a little post--somewhat unusual for the DD--about frugal ways of improving your computer's performance.
Outside of this we have some familiar articles from last week. My AstraZeneca purchase has lifted itself up the rank a little as has my Old Mutual purchase. No doubt both helped by notably price drops recently.
Anyway, without any further ado, here is my breakdown for the week beginning 13 June 2015:
- ★ The Maestro's Movers: Neil Woodford's Big Buys and Sells in May 2015
- ★ RAMping Up My Laptop Performance on the Cheap with a RAM Upgrade (and Other Tweaks)
- ▼ BUY: WPP--Doubling Up on a Global Media Giant
- ▬ May 2015: Dividend Income, Trading Activity and Portfolio Snapshot
- ▬ BUY: Legal & General--Growth and Income Going for a Song?
- ▬ A Minor Miner Addition: South32 Joins My Portfolio After BHP Billiton Demerger
- ▲ BUY: AstraZeneca--Healthy Future in Healthcare?
- ▼ BUY: Stock Spirits Group--Spirited Growth in Central and Eastern Europe?
- ▲ BUY: Old Mutual--A great growth and income company
- ▲ Shifting My Portfolio into "Retirement Gear": Primitive Proposed Plan and Timescales
"Over There"
NOTE: The "Over There" is nothing like the "On Here" list. It is qualitative through and through and is simply chosen by me from what I read (and mostly commented on) during the week. It is not really a ranking but a motley bag of (excellent) items.So what about articles published elsewhere? Here is a little list of what caught my eye.
This again is a wonderful mix of fascinating articles. Particularly of note--under the frugality section--is a post by the Finance Zombie. I strongly advise reading that one. But beyond that each of the main sections are bulging with quality posts this week. So plenty for you to peruse!
Anyway, hopefully you enjoy reading these as much as I did.
FIRE (Financial Independence/Retiring Early) Planning and Strategy
- 10 Critical Tips for Dividend Growth Investors (Sure Dividend)--Great post from Ben. I found the section on the respective performance of high yield, low payout companies very striking.
- Who Wants to Be A Retirement Millionaire? (Early Retirement Guy)--Targeting a pension over £1 million? Be aware of some of the disadvantages here.
- Why Dividend Investors should never use stop losses? (Dividend Growth Investor)--Do you use stop losses as a dividend investor? DGI explores whether they are useful or not.
- Investing by Numbers (Portfolio Sale) (DIY Income Investor)--40% return in 9 months. Not a bad result. A good example of DIY Income Investor's investment policy in action.
- Why I Hold Bonds in My Portfolio (Retirement Investing Today)--Do you hold bonds or not? RIT explains--thoroughly and effectively--why the RIT portfolio certainly contains bonds.
FIRE (Financial Independence/Retiring Early) Progress
- Adding Legal & General to my High Dividend Yield Portfolio (HYP) (Retirement Investing Today)--ERT picks up shares in L&G. Also provides an update on the HYPs performance.
- My $100m tax-free account? (Fire v London)--An advert for the real value of ISAs (or, rather, NISAs).
- SIPP Drawdown Review - End Yr 3 (DIY Investor (UK)--John updates us on his progress with his SIPP drawdown as well as how it has operated so far.
Investing
- Seven Dividend Growth Stocks to Consider for Further Research (Dividend Growth Investor)--Some very interesting companies to put on your watchlist. Medical equipment maker, Bard, caught my eye.
- Why I won’t be buying shares in J Sainsbury (UK Value Investor)--Should you buy Sainsbury's? John explains why he won't be anytime soon despite it being--by some metrics--attractively priced.
- Invesco Income Trust - Final Results (DIY Investor (UK))--A nice little run down of the results of the UK-focused investment trust.
- Iron deficiency – Why do analysts so rarely drop their long-term commodity price forecasts? (Value Perspective: Nick Kirrage)--Where do analysts really think the long-term commodity trends are going? Fascinating to read if you--like me--have exposure to miners.
- FTSE 100 forecast and valuation – June 2015 (UK Value Investor)--John provides a wonderfully thorough run-down of why the CAPE suggests that the FTSE 100 remains somewhat undervalued. Well worth a read!
- Why Invest for Dividend Income? (Sure Dividend)--A very cogent and concise summary of why dividend investing is so appealing (and why the stock market does not have to be a "casino").
Budgeting and Frugality
Misc
- The “Pay Yourself Rule” And Why It Works (Frugal Cottage)--Do you pay yourself each month? You probably should. Read why here.
- Frugality Only Works if You Let It Penetrate Your Subconscious (First Quarter Finance)--Has frugality penetrated your subconscious yet? Do you automatically avoid excessive spending or still have to pinch yourself to keep on target?
- A test of my frugality armour (Finance Zombie)--If you read just one article on this list. Make it this one. An excellent read with a wonderfully important message in it.
Misc
- How to Lie with Statistics (Total Return Investor)--Nice review of a classic and excellent book on the use and misuse of statistics: How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff*. Another book along these lines that I really advise (with more UK-focused examples) in The Tiger That Isn't by Andrew Dilnott and Michael Blastland*. Both well worth a read. (ED: For one which includes a lot of statistical chicanery in the medical profession--including, sadly, my two healthcare investments--you should read Bad Science by Ben Goldacre* [* affiliate links]
- i’m back!!! (The Firestarter)--After a prolonged absence thanks to a technical issue, TFS is back. Here he offers a little personal update for you.
- Gambling for Cashback, Home Brew Beer #4 and OOO (Quietly Saving)--A nice little update from an American brew to "flipping" a cashback offer on a couple of gambling sites.
"Over to You"
Anyway, that is it for this week. And here, as promised an age ago (or rather a few lines above), the "Over to You" bit.What did you read this week that you found really interesting related to investing, personal finance or financial independence?
Make a comment below and include a link. Then we can all take a look!
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Creative Commons image reproduced from Flickr user Ruz
Thank you for sharing your well curated list Drive. There are several quality posts, coming at these topics form several different directions. Have a great weekend.
ReplyDelete-Bryan
Thanks, Bryan. Glad you found some of them of interest. This week was a particularly strong one for high-quality posts. I was pretty much swamped with them, hence why this list is a little later in the day than usual!
DeleteYou have a great weekend as well!
Hi DD
ReplyDeleteThanks for linking me and for another great list, including highlighting a couple of books I'd be interested in reading.
'How to lie with Statistics' reminds me of a recent all employees meeting we had where they presented the results of an employee survey. A big deal was made of the 'positive' fact that 60% of employees thought the Senior Leadership Team were doing a good job. They glossed over the fact that that meant 40% thought they were doing a crap job haha!
Newspapers always use dodgy stats in their sensational headlines and most people fall for them.
My pleasure. You knocked together some great material again. I really must try some home brewing. I'd love to have a go at making a stout.
DeleteHaha, sounds like a familiar situation the business world over. I remember a similar conversation about a website redesign myself.
I would strongly advise The Tiger That Isn't. Really is a very good book in that genre. I have read it a few times. Always get something additional out of it!
Newspapers very regularly use dodgy headlines. Indeed, the the book I mention above abounds with many stories from the press. Ben Goldacre wrote a good book along those lines regarding the medical profession which is also good. I will include a link on that above as well shortly.