Student Transportation is up for Sale!

Hello everybody! I would like to share some news about the recent acquisition of Student Transportation (STB.TO). Student Transportation will be acquired privately for $7.50 US per share which is about $9.60 in Canadian currency.

With 340 shares on hands, I will receive over $3000 in cash. My capital gain will be at least 50%, plus the dividend income I received over the past five years. STB paid a great monthly dividend which yielded on average 8%. I have mixed feelings about this deal because I will lose a great dividend payer.

I always was a buyer of the stock when it was trading below $6.00. Over the past five years I accumulated 340 shares. All of my STB shares will be exchanged for cash. The deal should be closed in a few months.

All proceeds will be reinvested. I don’t have any ideas yet about my next purchase, but I will be monitoring my existing positions for bargain prices.

If you have shares in STB, let me know what you plan to do next? Would you sell here or wait for a higher offer?

Recent Purchase: Morguard REIT

The second purchase of the year is in the books. Today I bought 70 shares of Morguard REIT (MRT.UN.TO) for $13.33 per share. I took advantage of the recent market volatility and decided to double my position in MRT. My total position in MRT is now 140 shares.

Thank you Mr. Market Volatility because I was able to double my position with less capital. The first time I bought MRT was in June of 2017. Back then, I paid $14.80 per share. Today, the same amount of shares costed me a $100 less. Now I need to figure out how to spend an extra $100.

What I like about Morguard REIT is that their business is well diversified. They have exposure in industrial properties, offices, residential buildings, and shopping malls. MRT pays a monthly dividend of $0.08 per share so this purchase will add $5.60 to my monthly income.

Portfolio Value Update - January 2018

The first month of 2018 is in the books and it’s time for me to report my monthly progress. In January, the Canadian stock market started strong and continued to march higher, except for the last week. The last week of January, the markets tumbled. We saw a sharp sell-off and my portfolio lost about $1000 in just a few days. I have to admit that the correction was anticipated because of the rich valuations.  I’m in buying mode so any corrections are welcome because it allows me to buy cheaper shares. So why not?

Portfolio Value
As of January 31, 2018 my investment portfolio balance stood at $52,785.20. That’s an increase of $187.29 from last month. That’s a lousy increase because of the sell-off we had on the last week of the month. Still, a positive change is better than a negative.

Dividends
In January, I received a total of $240.83 in dividends vs $195.63 for the same period a year ago. That's an increase of $45.20 or 23% on year-over-year basis. The best part of dividend growth investing is no matter what the market does, the dividends are growing like a snowball that’s rolling off the mountain.

Contribution
In January, I contributed $700 of fresh capital to my TFSA account. I mentioned in the past that my contribution amount will be lowered in 2018 from $800 to $700 per month. This is because I want to equally spread out the purchasing power throughout the year. Had I continued to contribute $800/month to my TFSA account, I would have reached my limit before December.

Transaction
I made one transaction in January by purchasing more shares in Brookfield Property Partners. More details about this purchase in my previous post.

Online Income
Neobux: $21.37
LegerWeb: $4.50
Adsense: $10.96

Total income from online sources is $36.83. This is the area that I find it hard to maintain and keep growing.

My Neobux earnings are on autopilot, but in January there were fewer ads available. The LegerWeb earnings are based on the amount of surveys I do. I received fever surveys this month as well.

And my Adsense earnings are almost the same, but will be heavily affected as of next month. My YouTube channel will be demonetized because it will not meet the new criteria as of February 20, 2018. I will need to grow my channel to 1,000 subscribers in order to qualify for the YouTube Partner Program. I will be working on that this year.