I don't get it

For some reason that I absolutely cannot understand, the Swedish krona continues to strengthen compared to the US dollar. As a Swede, I am of course happy about this but extremely irritated that I cannot see the factors that contribute to this.

Since nothing has changed in Sweden since the end of last year when the krona exchange rate was significantly weaker against the US dollar, it irritates me to no end that I don't understand what is causing the Swedish krona to strengthen so much in 2025.

One explanation is said to be that many Swedes have sold off their American holdings due to the US trade war with the rest of the world over tariffs, but I don't think that's the whole explanation, far from it. Another is said to be the rumour that circulated earlier that Sweden was about to change the Swedish krona for the euro.

Whoever it is who defends the Swedish krona, I wonder how long they are willing to participate in the "war". There is always a limit.

AI generated image with Grok

One of our exceptions

In January 2025, when 1 US dollar costed more than 11 SEK, we chose to buy a Swedish stock that we thought had growth potential, namely Investor AB - Class B. We didn't manage to sell our holding in Investor at the absolute peak, but we were close enough. In early May, we sold our entire holding and made a good profit.

Buying growth companies is definitely not our strategy, but something we do when, for example, factors such as the exchange rate make a potentially good acquisition bad and at the same time we see a buying opportunity in a company that we consider ourselves to have sufficient knowledge about.

It is very likely that we will invest most of the sales proceeds in Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. (ARE) tonight when the stock market opens.

AI generated image with Grok

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel

This time of year is not effortless for any student, but it is especially demanding for students in the higher grades. Junior, who is in grade 11, has had end-of-year exams throughout May and still has three more to go before he is done for this grade. Since the world's (maybe not) most perfect teenager hasn't studied as much as I and the world's most perfect husband wanted, he has to study considerably more than if he had only needed to refresh his knowledge.

Our son, whose self-confidence is initially very good, does not benefit from the extra boost that typical teenage self-confidence gives with confirmation that they can and know everything, and he gladly takes the chance if he is given the opportunity to refrain from studying for exams because, due to the above, he already knows and can do everything, and therefore does not really understand the necessity of studying.

Since I chose to take primary responsibility for school early in Junior's school year, it has meant that I have spent exactly as much time at home as Junior because I regularly have to go to his room to alternately hug him or make sure he is actually studying.

After today, only tomorrow remains because the last end-of year exam is on Wednesday. It'll be nice to get out of house arrest.

AI generated image with Grok

Sometimes it's good to have a squirrel AKA my husband

It is almost 14 years since we bought an iMac. That computer worked flawlessly until a little over a year ago when it suddenly stopped working from one day to the next. It turned out that it was an automatic update from Adobe that had locked the computer. I really loved that computer and was downhearted when it stopped working.

Since then, I have unsuccessfully asked the world's most perfect husband on several occasions for help with factory resetting the computer because I couldn't do it myself. I've had the iMac sitting on my desk because I didn't have the heart to take it to the recycling center for electronic waste. No matter how light and agile my MacBook is, it can never compare to my iMac despite its age.

It wasn't until I told him I was going to unscrew the hard drive and drop off the iMac at the electronics recycling center for electronic waste that the squirrel in him came to life. Immediately he started searching the internet for how to factory reset a very old iMac. Finally, he found a page that very instructively showed us how to proceed.

It worked perfectly so now I have a computer with a large screen which is handy when I need to have several windows open at the same time, for example when I enter our dividends.

AI generated image with Grok

My latest chart

Building charts in spreadsheets is incredibly satisfying. The attached chart below is my latest and even though I told the world's most perfect husband that this is the last one on this spreadsheet, I know deep down that's probably not the case.

The right bar in the chart shows expected dividends for 2025 while the left bar shows actual dividends. The left bar is divided into blue for ordinary dividends and red for extraordinary dividends.

Click to enlarge