The best move for me was sitting pat through the start of COVID, and not executing on trades until June 2020.
Took the cash that had accrued from divvys and reinforced positions in bank stocks that had weakened and loaded up on REITs, who had had the shit kicked out of them.
I have not tallied those moves in detail, other than to say REITS have recovered quite nicely, and the banks are all sitting pretty and have just been allowed to start raising their divvy pay outs, so that bodes well for both amount of dividends and the stock price to generally appreciate.
The second best move was to buy into an actively managed preferred share ETF.
Preffereds I believe are worth the management as the pool in Canada is kinda small and there are likely arbitrage and other situation Joe Q public are not savvy to.
Put 210K in 2018. Spits about $900 per month payment, mix of dividends and return of capital.
The slide in rates since when we got in on this means folks are clamoring for yield wherever it can be found. The holding is now worth 280K, even with the payouts not part of that sum, as not reinvested.
Rates will change, and likely the thing will be back at $210K in the coming decade, erasing and capital gains once the payout ACB is factored in.
In the mean time we will stay with it while payout keeps up. Rate resets in the preferred shares it holds are likely to make it into a bit f a slower horse over time.