Another year has come and gone. The former iPIG portfolio tentatively closed 2025 at $215,960.98 (subject to change a bit as the portfolio’s year-end statement is generated). That’s up a whopping 28.3% from the $168,332.75 on the 2024 year-end brokerage statement.
That’s way above expectations, and I do not believe it to be sustainable. It’s also well ahead of an investment in the S&P 500 index tracker SPY, which looks like it returned around 18.0% on the year with dividends reinvested.
For a sense of scale, the former iPIG portfolio was launched in December of 2012, with a total of $30,000 (Introducing the Inflation-Protected Income Growth Portfolio | The Motley Fool ). Since inception, no new money has been added. All taxes except for foreign dividend withholding taxes have been paid out of another pocket, and no money aside from those foreign dividend withholding taxes have been withdrawn from the account.
Importantly for the design of the account, it received $3,936.77 in dividend-like income in 2025, up almost 8.8% from the $3,619.03 it received in 2024. That compares favorably to the 2.7% reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics as the change in the consumer price index over the most recent reported 12 months. Of course, I wish my personal inflation rate had been only 2.7% over the past 12 months, but that’s a topic for another post…
The portfolio was greatly helped by its exposure to a couple of technology stocks. Its holding of Seagate was up 219% and its holding of Broadcom was up 49%. As appreciative as I am of those gains, continued growth near that level requires a whole lot to go right that I’m not counting on.
Indeed, after yet another year of doing very little for the account, it’s probably time to start paying a bit better attention to it.
Regards,
-Chuck
Disclosure: I own shares of Seagate and Broadcom