Updates

It's done. SMIF is at 100k. But let me be honest about how it actually played out, because it wasn't the clean finish I'd pictured. For the month of June I managed to get the SMIF position to within 1,545 shares of the 100k target - so close, but for a perfectionist like me it was genuinely hard not to have the full round number sitting there. That's exactly why the July dividend lands just short of the £500 mark - £492.98 - because the June ex-div caught me at the slightly lower count. A small thing, but my goblin brain noticed it. So today I made a decision. I trimmed the LGEN position by 549 shares, which leaves me with a round 126,000 there. The sale went through at £2.875 per share, and that was enough to finally complete the SMIF 100k today. Mission properly accomplished. There's still about £250 sitting in the account, and with the SMIF dividend landing in July plus the RECI quarterly coming on the 24th, I'll be doing some shopping next month. On top of that, I'm anticipating somewhere around £15-20k from an AI product windfall to add into the mix - that would go straight into bolstering the NCYF and RECI positions. July is shaping up to be a good month for shopping for new income. Now, I'll admit I have mixed emotions about selling those 549 LGEN shares. But here's how I've made my peace with it - ultimately the portfolio is there for me to use, and I shouldn't feel guilty about actually using it. It gives me a round number on LGEN now, a position that was already oversized anyway, and my longer-term target there is still to build it up to 130k eventually. The trade-off is that my September LGEN payment is likely to be around £7,865 rather than £7,899. When you look at it like that, it's a tiny change - and the peace of mind of finally getting SMIF to a clean 100k is more than worth it. So why did I have to sell LGEN rather than just use existing cashflow and dividend income? Like I always say - life happens. Nepal turned out more expensive than I'd budgeted for and I had to pay all that off, and there was some personal stuff going on that cost a bit more than expected too. It is what it is. But now? Now I'm genuinely excited to get back to growing the portfolio again. The four pillars are all standing, SMIF is complete, and the machine keeps running.

I have dreamt of this day. And whilst it's always nice to see a big dividend like this land - £19,830 from LGEN - it's actually pretty anti-climactic. Because it already has a home. There's no decision to agonise over, no temptation to do something clever with it. It goes straight into SMIF, exactly as the plan said it would months ago. The dividend hit and it just works - that's the whole feeling, and it's a genuinely nice thing to watch happen. Sticking to the plan is the least dramatic and most satisfying thing in the world. The only mildly chaotic part is the plumbing. My LGEN shares sit across three brokers, so the £19,830 landed in three separate pieces. Just over £7k came in via Trading212 - and kudos to them, withdrawals are basically instant, so that money is already sitting in my bank ready to be fired into the next broker. Just shy of £8k landed in Freetrade, where withdrawals take a few days, so I expect that to clear on Monday - coincidentally the exact same day the monthly SMIF dividend arrives. And about £4.8k hit the Saxo account, which has already been put straight to work buying more shares. That last buy takes my live SMIF total up to 82,896. I'm keeping the dashboard showing the full 100k, because that's exactly where this lands over the next few days - the money is all here, it's just the slow shuffle of broker to bank to broker that takes a moment. The plan for today is to push that £7k now sitting in my bank over to Saxo and use it to take the share count north of 90k. Then when the slower Freetrade transfer finally clears, we call it - mission complete. I'll write a proper update when it's fully locked in, probably Monday or Tuesday. Once it is, that's £500/month base income from a single pillar, paying every single month like clockwork. Quite awesome to type out. Now the honest bit - I didn't actually manage to invest anything in May in the end. The Kathmandu trip got a little too luxury and I spent more than I'd planned. Six or seven thousand USD by the time it was all done. And you know what? Not a bad thing at all. That's exactly what life is for. It was genuinely life-changing in terms of direction, relationships, and figuring out where I actually want to be in the future. Worth every dollar. Outside of finishing off the SMIF target this week, I'll probably be a bit light on investing in June too. One of the quiet advantages of all this reliable income is that you can start using credit cards cleverly - stagger costs across multiple statements, not pay everything at once, and still know with total certainty that you're fine. The peace of mind the portfolio gives me is second to none. I'm excited to get back to accelerating it soon. On that note - one of the AI products I built recently has been having a good time. I think the initial campaign alone might do around 50k USD. If that lands, I'll have a proper chunk to put into the RECI and NCYF positions. And I think we're getting to the point where the LGEN position needs to be at 100% just to satisfy my OCD goblin brain. That's all I've got for this early June update.

Writing this from Kathmandu. The trip was a bit last minute - threw the bag together and got out. Spent some time hiking in the Himalayas, which has a way of putting everything else in perspective, and I'm now doing a bit of a fitness bootcamp whilst working remotely. The seasonal business has gone into its quiet months so the timing worked out. The thing that keeps hitting me out here is this - the dividends I'm currently receiving more than cover the cost of living comfortably in a place like Nepal. That's the whole point. That's what we're building. It's one thing to see the numbers on a dashboard and another to actually live it for a few weeks. The May SMIF dividend landed today - £579.57 in the account, the bonus 0.75p as confirmed. YTD now £2,069.71. Back to the standard 0.5p for June, which works out to £386.38. Now the strategic bit - the market is volatile right now with all sorts of external factors swirling around, so I'm keeping the SMIF payment on the sidelines and looking to deploy a similar amount on top. About £1,000 going into something this month. Either LGEN if I see a clean opportunity, or continue building up the NCYF position. LGEN has gone ex-div so the next move there waits on that large June payment. That's the one earmarked to push SMIF to the 100k share target - and that's when the real compounding effects of the portfolio start to kick in properly. Four pillars, all paying, income buying more income. The snowball is growing.

Quick one - email from SMIF just landed. The 0.75p dividend for May is confirmed (not the base 0.5p), so that's great to hear. Payment date is May 8th, not May 6th as I had down. Tone of the declaration was cautious but sensible - the Directors noted the ongoing interest rate environment and global market volatility, did their careful assessment, and concluded dividends for the year ending 30 September 2026 are likely to be in excess of 6.5 pence per share. So they're adding the extra 0.25p on top of the regular 0.5p monthly for the period ended 31 March 2026. Third year running of the bonus. Dashboard updated - May payment now showing £579.57 instead of £386.38.

NCYF is officially on the board. The fourth and final pillar of the dividend machine is live. Bought 3,300 shares at 50.1p per share - it's a smaller buy than I'd have liked, but consistency matters more than size. The Iran situation has knocked my earnings a bit, and I had family visiting which meant spending money on actually enjoying life. What's the point of building all this if you never live? I make no excuses for the smaller buy. About £1,025 of new money went in this month. But here's the exciting part - the RECI dividend (£250.50) and the SMIF dividend (£386.38) made up more than 30% of this NCYF position. Income buying more income. That's the flywheel starting to turn and it feels brilliant. Quarterly payer with a 4.5p annual dividend, split as three payments of 1p and one bigger 1.5p payment in August. That means £33 heading my way in May from NCYF alone. Every pillar is now producing. The April SMIF dividend landed on the 7th as expected - another £386.38 banked, bringing the YTD to £1,490.14. Four months in, four payments received, like clockwork. The interesting SMIF story continues to be whether they'll declare 0.75p again for the next cycle like the last two years, or play it safe with the 0.5p base. I'm being conservative and projecting the 0.5p, but the upside surprise would be very welcome. Looking ahead - we're heading into the slower tourism months so cashflow will likely tighten up. But I've got a new business launching which could be interesting. As always, you never know if you don't try these things. So either an unpredictable quiet few months before next high season kicks in, or a new venture erupts into glorious cashflow. Let's see. Either way, all four pillars are live and paying. The machine keeps running.

Happy Easter from the cave. Writing this on a bank holiday while the world continues to be... interesting. The Iran war is still rattling markets and creating this general atmosphere of not really knowing what's happening next. Temperamental, unstable, pick your adjective. But here's the thing - this is all short-term noise in the grand scheme of things. Could I try to pivot strategy and take advantage of the weakness in various positions? Sure. But that's not really what this is about. The plan is the plan. Speaking of which - RECI's first quarterly dividend hit the account today. £250.50 banked. That's pillar three officially producing income. We're now waiting on the SMIF payment on April 7th - that £386.38 plus the RECI dividend plus a bit of new money should see a buy of 4-5k shares of NCYF. That's the play. Opening the fourth and final pillar. April is shaping up to be an interesting month beyond just the NCYF opening. SMIF have announced a 0.75p dividend the last two years running compared to their 0.5p base rate. All eyes on whether they continue with the 0.75 or if this global shock sees them play it cautious and stick with the 0.5. Interesting times either way. On the LGEN front - there was an initial shock when the war kicked off but the recovery has actually been impressive. Their buyback programme at the lower prices will have been seen as a bargain internally, and I believe the main shock is now priced in. All the scenarios and forecasts have been done, baked into best and worst case projections. Barring a catastrophic escalation, I'd say all funds are now accustomed to the new world order and executing with that information rather than seeing the massive panic selloffs we saw initially. If prices stay depressed as we head into the June LGEN dividend, that's actually good news for us - the SMIF 100k target becomes easier to reach and we'll have more funds to play with. We keep executing. The machine keeps running.

Quick correction first - I had the SMIF ex-dividend date wrong. It's April 7th, not whatever I had in my head before. Noted. Now onto the bigger picture. LGEN reported earnings and the dividend is confirmed at 15.67 pence per share, payable June 4th. That's £19,830 heading my way in June. The share price has taken a beating though - the Iranian war, general global uncertainty, the usual cocktail of things you can't control. SMIF has dipped a bit too. RECI is now the other side of the March 12th ex-div date, so that first quarterly payout of £250.50 is locked in for April 2nd. Here's the thing though - despite all the short-term noise, the dividends are still being declared. The income is still coming. Companies are still paying out. That's literally the entire point of building this portfolio. When the world gets uncertain and things feel shaky, I'm still getting paid. The share prices wobble but the income doesn't care. If anything, the dips are opportunities. LGEN at these prices is looking increasingly tempting, SMIF too. I just wish I had more spare cash to deploy right now. That's always the way isn't it - the best buying opportunities show up when your pockets are lightest. But I'm not stressing. The machine is running. The dividends are confirmed. The plan hasn't changed. Short-term noise is just that - noise.

Put in a buy order for another 4,350 shares of RECI this morning. If it goes through - and I don't anticipate any issues - that takes us to 8,350 shares ahead of the March 12th ex-dividend date. Six days early. This month has been pretty turbulent with the Iranian war kicking off, and it's been interesting watching the markets react. I was in two minds about adding to the LGEN position, and SMIF has dropped a little so that was tempting too. But I decided to hold off on any action until the March SMIF dividend hit - which it did today, £386.38 banked. With that confirmed, I stuck to the original plan: get RECI to a decent size before the first dividend. Job done. The pivot now is NCYF. The ex-dividend date for that is mid-April, so the plan is to use the April SMIF income plus the first RECI quarterly payout (both landing April 2nd) to start building that position, along with any spare business funds. Speaking of business - with this war, tourism in Southeast Asia could take a hit. I'm keeping a close eye on it. I'm not expecting much spare cash to deploy going forward, and there's a real chance this drags us into an earlier low season than usual. Which is exactly why I'm building this out. Things get turbulent. When they do, you want a plan to get through them. That's what Wealth Goblin is all about.

RECI is officially on the board. Pulled the trigger on the first 4,000 shares - I like round numbers. This is the third pillar of the dividend machine and it feels good to finally have skin in the game here. Quarterly payer at 3p per share, so that's £120 heading my way in April. The ex-dividend date is projected around March 12th, so if things go well I'd love to sneak in another 1,000 shares before then to bump that April payout to £150. 5,000 is a nice clean number. After that, the focus shifts to opening the NCYF position - the fourth and final pillar. Once both RECI and NCYF are running alongside SMIF and LGEN, the lumpiness of the payments really starts to smooth out. Monthly income from SMIF, quarterly from RECI and NCYF on alternating months, semi-annual from LGEN. Small dopamine hits landing regularly instead of waiting months between paydays. That's what keeps the motivation locked in. It's gonna be epic when all four positions are complete, but slowly does it. Feed the pile.

Well... I've been doing a bit of an audit on myself and my businesses. Tax season after all. I ran every single bank statement through AI and found some interesting things. My accounting is now 90% cheaper than it was before and more accurate thanks to some Python script wizardry. This was actually a fun process - it helped me reflect on goals for the year ahead, where I can cut some stuff, where I can add some other stuff, and just how I live. As I transition into this work optionality mode, I thought it wise to diversify a little. Did some deep research on new positions, payouts, dividend histories - the usual goblin due diligence. Decided on building new positions in 2 companies this year: RECI (real estate credit) and NCYF (high yield bonds). I'm not sure how far I'll get, but we'll give it a good stab. It's important to make these hardcore targets and plans because ultimately if you fail, you'll still be 50/60/70/80% of the way there - which is better than having no plan at all. Expect a RECI buy imminently. I found some money down the back of the sofa with my AI accounting that I thought wasn't there.

End of January buy done a little early. Deployed 4,546 shares into the SMIF Hoard - that's the final £4,000 of new money going in. Total now sits at 77,276 shares with 22,724 to go. Base dividend locked at £386.38/month. Here's the plan: the big June dividend payout should cover those remaining shares to hit 100k. Things are super uncertain right now - business volatility, USD exchange rate headwinds, navigating fires daily - but I'm choosing my moments to lock in value where I can. Might try to sneak in another 2,724 shares to round up to a clean 80k - the goblin brain likes tidy numbers - but if business doesn't perform, I'll live with the messy number for now. Expect lighter investment months ahead, but the focus is now shifting to pumping up the dividend portfolio. There's a key ex-div date in April I'd love to hit with a chunk, but never say never. Annual gym renewal and other life costs are coming up - that's exactly what this SMIF baseline is for. Peace of mind when the entrepreneurial life gets rocky.

First buy of 2026 is in. Deployed 6,530 new shares into the SMIF Hoard at 87p per share - just over £5,300 of new money. Total holding now sits at 72,730 shares with 27,270 to go. Here's where it gets nerdy: I'm projecting one more buy at the end of January (~£3-3.5k of new money), and that should be the last new money going into SMIF. From February onwards, all fresh funds get funneled into the dividend portfolio instead. The big June dividend payout from that portfolio is earmarked to push SMIF to the 100k mark. The math checks out - SMIF is effectively on auto-pilot from end of January. Focus now shifts to growing those dividend projections higher and higher. I still can't quite believe I'm in this position. There's a real disconnect between the numbers on screen and real life at this point, but it's years of hard work to get here. Surreal.

Christmas Eve check-in. December has been more challenging than expected on the business side - exchange rates have been brutal and that always stings. The SMIF dividend payout of £331 is due on January 5th, so the decision on how much goes into the pie will be made then. Projecting it'll still be £5,300 in new money, plus using the full £331 dividend to buy on top of that. Will post the actual numbers once the buy is complete around the 5th. That's a wrap on 2025 for the Wealth Goblin - see you in the new year.

Just deployed another 6,110 shares into the SMIF Hoard for approximately £5,300. Total holding now sits at 66,200 shares - well on the way to that 100k target. Business had a strong month, and if things keep going this way, expecting to drop a similar buy at the end of December. The pile grows.

Wealth Goblin comes out of the shadows. I am apprehensive to share this as I keep most of my financials bottled up but hey I'm the Wealth Goblin and I'd like to share finally what I am doing. Here it is, laid out in black and white... well... the colors of the site. Expect updates here monthly based on what I have done with income at the end of each month but at the moment, full steam ahead for the SMIF Hoard train.