Option trade diary #2 – ASR

ASR this time, an insurance company from the Netherlands, one that hasn’t been on a lot of radars. Most people look towards bigger firms like NN, or Munich Re in Germany. To name just 2. For me ASR has been interesting for some time now. People always need insurance and as an insurance company ASR is doing a nice job. It’s been up in recent years due to good results and product development. Also the margins are pretty good. So is the dividend.

Recently the stock has been under pressure due too interest rate concerns and general turmoil. Which means people buy up bonds and this impact insurers , amongst others. As the market always has a bit of a knee jerk reaction, I think this stock will be recovering , and if not I am happy owning a few. So I sold a put option
for December 2019 strike price 34 euro’s. For which I received 165 euro’s.

It’s now a matter of time, either I will have too buy at 34, roll the option for another time in the future or receive the premium. Either way I will be content. Especially with the last possibility. Let’s wait and see.

July 2017 – Dividend

August 2017 again, so it’s time for the monthly dividend rundown. Dividend slightly behind compared to last year. Mainly because of exchange rates, the dollar is pretty cheap at the moment which reflects in the 17% degrease in dividend amount. This is because I have to convert the dollars back to euros. Maybe I should check the possibility of hedging against these risks. Now the list 🙂 Until next time !

Overview :

28-07-17 Dow Chemical Company EUR 3,93
27-07-17 Walt Disney Company EUR 0,60
26-07-17 Cisco Systems EUR 6,94
25-07-17 General Electric Company EUR 4,51
14-07-17 W.P. Carey Inc USD EUR 8,55
06-07-17 Unibail-Rodamco EUR 5,10
05-07-17 Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS ETF EUR 1,43
03-07-17 Coca-Cola Company EUR 4,74

Totaal EUR 35,80

Running again

After a couple of months of knee problems and general fatigue I did a little run this past Tuesday, just to see if my knee would hold up. It did. It was a bit sore the day after but not in ways it was before. I could walk normally without any pain and put pressure on my knee. So now I can slowly pick up running again. And start building some strength in my knee with some nice and boring exercises.

It felt good to out running again and I realized how much I missed it and how big the impact is on my mind. Just that slow 30 minutes running made me feel so much better. Strange how this works.
I am now working on a nice little training schedule, 3 times a week for now and some core training. Already found a few inspiring running books to read while I am working on my fitness.
It’s nice to know I can stick to a plan again.

Modern Football , finally some good news ?

Modern football, a term that’s almost old school again. It’s against a lot of things. Modern stadiums , modern stadium catering, seating , ticket prices, idiotic hired stewards eh hosts and hostesses. And a lot of other things, let’s not forget the bans , mandatory away travelling arrangements. The lot basically. It used to be better, so much better. Standing in the wind, rain , and cold. Drinks and food sold out or robbed out at half time. Waiting at the tickets office for hours on end hoping to get a ticket to European matches. You get the picture although I might have overstated some of the above. Everybody has their own more or less romanticized view on days past.

Today it was announced the 4 most important football nations in Europe will have 4 places each for the Champions League. You know the competition for the champions of the different European leagues. Didn’t know we had 4 in each. I know, I know it’s been a silly name for a number of years now.

The smaller country’s will lose more once again. This has been an ongoing process. In the Netherlands every club in the 90’s envisioned European titles in their ambitions, building new expensive stadiums. Building mountains of debt and subsequently getting in a lot of distress. But sports as a business is a reality, has been for some time and everyone was looking to the US for examples of how to run a sports business. Club managers attended seminars , conferences and got their heads filled with silly ideas, supporters are customers, hospitality packages and all seater stadiums. Some Football clubs even went on the stock market. Forgetting one thing, the supporters.

Supporting a team in Europe means something vastly different then in the US. In the big 3 sports anyway. In the US people can move teams around the country, from Oakland to LA and back again as was the case with the Raiders. In my view there is a bit of a culture behind it. For me there was.

In any case , money took over in Europe. League tickets are expensive and the former working class Saturday/Sunday adventures became unobtainable for a lot of people. Well Saturday turned into Monday , Tuesday and other every day of the week basically. But people have to work. You can’t be expected to travel half way across the country on a Monday for a 7PM kick off. Most of us not anyway.

One important aspect of being a supporter of a club is the social element. Most people who end up going to the fixtures where either taken by their parents, other family or just decided to go with friends. All at a young age. For a small amount of money you could go enjoy the atmosphere , the build up, watch a game and share the stories for years and years to come. Friendships for life are forged and now matter what you will always follow that club. More or less with the same people season in and out. Whether it be a local team or one of the bigger clubs. For what ? the Football, no off course not it’s the social side of things. Meeting up , seeing old friends , reminiscing on old stories. Sharing experiences and beer.

The big leagues are getting too expensive for young people to really get attached to a club. Watching it on TV will not let you make any new friends, experience the days out (far more fun most of the time than the actual match.) and feel the energy of those once in a lifetime victories in the dying seconds of a cup final. Bringing your kids is too expensive, and they will not choose a club , but a player so you end buying another team’s shirt every season because your kids favourite player just moved. For another record braking sum of money. And this is very wrong.

But ….

In the smaller competitions and countries ousted of the champions league due to the new rules, I see a lot of room for improvements. At first it will be a lot less. Some fans will lose their European away games. Which I must admit are legendary. Less money from TV, sponsors and everything else. As a club you will probably have to sell all of the talent every season , and that maybe a bit of an annoyance.

Less money from all those distractions will hopefully achieve the following, and I know I will stretch it a bit here. Quality games will not be readily available any more. After a few seasons most of the tourists will stay away, thus leaving the clubs with the few die-hards who are willing to sacrifice all of their money for a season ticket. Eventually prices will have to come down, in other words getting people to go to the stadium on a very regular basis will be the main source of income. The rotten dialogue between most club boards and their supporters will have to be restored. Supporters will once again have a say in clubs , idiotic Monday night games will be a thing of the past. Everyone will play on a Saturday (sorry personal preference , in my case Sunday’s 14:30 would be the real old school way) and thus have time for a night out afterwards.

Competitions will be far more exciting because most teams will be equally good (or bad). Parents will bring their kids again, they will make friends and after a few years will start going with their friends and make new friends, all friends for life. And so on , The balance of old is restored and new stories will be told for years to come.

Portfolio news – July 2016 additions

This month I have added some to an existing position again, first off Ahold Delhaize, which has finalized the merger in July and had an reverse split, there are now less stock available and I got extra dividend. Also less shares. In order to balance this out again I added to this position. I remain very positive about this stock.

I also added to the vanguard dividend appreciation ETF, It’s an product that is composed out of stocks that generate dividends, I do this when I have small amounts of cash left and it’s a low cost way of getting invested and be diversified at the same time. It’s ideal for everyone who doesn’t view finance and investing as a hobby. Because it’s low cost and maintenance free you really don’t have to pay attention and just add on a regular basis. Research shows it’s one of the best if not the best way to be invested, just buy an ETF that follows the index or is based on generating income.

Since I enjoy this as a hobby I tend to buy stocks rather than just ETF’s or other things like mutual funds and index funds. But if you are not, index and income ETF’s are a very good way of investing without having to do all the research into individual securities. And over time the ETF’s probably do better than my hand-picked selection. For me it’s also about the fun of doing the research. Time will tell.

The last addition to the portfolio is Bayer, which is a German company that is active in Healthcare and Agriculture , life science as it is described. It has a history of excellent growth and dividend keeps on going up, it has a good cash flow and isn’t high in debt. It’s maybe a bit on the expensive side at the moment, but I thinks that is generally the case in today’s markets.
Since this is a portfolio for the long term I am not to concerned about the price, and this stock is near it’s year lows so it’s not way too high.

So that’s it for this month, now on to the research for the next additions.

June 2016 – Dividend

A new month new dividends. It is starting to get a bit more every time. Last few months have been good, it’s not that I can retire but it is slowly but surely growing.
So these are the figures from June.

Dividends without the tax:

1-jun Dividend (UNILEVER DR) EUR 3,20
9-jun Dividend (MICROSOFT CORPORATION) EUR 3,27
10-jun Dividend (EMERSON ELECTRIC COMPA) EUR 4,32
16-jun Dividend (ICAHN ENTERPRISES L.P.) EUR 1,36
27-jun Dividend (RDSA dvd reinvestment plan) EUR 41,72
27-jun Dividend (VANGUARD DIV APPRECIAT) EUR 1,22

Total EUR 55.09

Running and recovery

Since my encephalitis I have been suffering from concentration problems, analytical and problem solving issues, among other things. My recovery has gone fairly steadily upwards in the beginning but now is stalling a bit. One thing that is helping me a lot is exercising. Especially running. It helps me regaining my energy and makes me feel very happy. As my Paris marathon got cancelled I have now selected a new Marathon as a nice goal to work towards. It’s not going to be an attempt on my PR, the aim is to get across the finish line in one piece.

My recovery experts told me I have to select a goal to work towards and that there should be no pressure. So this is what I selected. I will keep a log of my training activity and share my thoughts on how it’s affecting me in general and towards the recovery.