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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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It's always a competition

I really have a hard time being grateful for the development of our dividends, I always want them to develop better. It's probably the winning mentality in me because I don't see this as money, but rather stacks competing against each other. Having received more dividends after four months than we received in all of 2017 is better than I give the portfolio credit for.

Now the hunt has begun for 2021, the second year of the pandemic. Every time I look at this chart, I am reminded of the pandemic's impact on the world.

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I take a win where I can, a loser can't be picky

Although we failed to meet our April dividend target, April 2025 was, thankfully, better than April 2023, if only marginally.

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Boy, was I wrong!

Since I overestimated the exchange rate when preparing the spreadsheet for 2025, I was confident that I would have the tolerance on my side. Not once since 2017 has my fixed exchange rate between SEK/USD been to my disadvantage, quite the opposite. However, it took no more than two months, March 2025 to be exact, before the market showed who really is in charge.

The deficit that began in March 2025 only deepened in April 2025 and will likely continue to deepen further during both May and June 2025. I will not change my fixed exchange rate, but I will swallow the bitter pill and hope for the best in the second half of 2025.

The fact that I miss the goal for April and probably also May and June doesn't take away the joy that my Google Sheet is now flawless.

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Is tax the rich left-wing language to ruin the rich?

The left in Sweden is no different from the left in other countries. The solution to all their problems is to tax the rich. Something they already do.

On April 24, 2025, EkonomiFakta reported tax revenues by income group. In Sweden, approximately 60% of total tax revenue comes from taxes on labor, primarily income taxes and general payroll tax. However, there is a big difference in how much different individuals pay in taxes, because the tax rate is progressive and increases the more you earn.

In these calculations, tax is defined as the sum of the taxes we declare ourselves in our income tax return. Most of this tax primarily relates to municipal and state income tax, capital tax and municipal property tax. Various tax deductions, such as earned income tax deductions and more, made in the income tax return, reduce the final tax on which the return is based.

In 2023, the income group with an annual income exceeding $80,000 contributed, they constitute 4% of taxpayers, with 24% of total tax payments.

The same year, the income group with an annual income below $19,900 contributed, they constitute 73% of taxpayers, with 12% of total tax payments.

Based on these facts, can one truly say that the rich pay too little in taxes, and above all, how sustainable is this? We are definitely not among the 4% with the highest annual income, but we have also started thinking about moving from Sweden as soon as the world's most perfect teenager finishes his university education. As the Swedish social contract fails, our willingness to work and pay taxes in Sweden is decreasing.

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It is not always easy to keep one's cool

The fluctuations in the USD/SEK exchange rate in recent months have been scarier than any ride at any amusement park worth its name. The portfolio may show black numbers only to show red numbers 60 minutes later even though stock prices have risen measured in USD.

According to the state-owned Swedish television (SVT), the current trend in Sweden is to sell American holdings to move the money to Sweden, something we have chosen not to do. Which is a significant factor in the inflow of capital to Sweden and thus a strengthened Swedish krona.

The world's most perfect husband and I still believe that America has significantly higher potential than Sweden and even Europe in the long term. Even if we are convinced that we are doing the right thing for ourselves and our finances, it can be worrying and difficult to keep it cool when the portfolio value drops by more than $50,000 in just a couple of hours and all news media in Sweden have BLOOD BATH as the headline for news about the American stock market.

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Group 2 - Q2 2025

This month's extra dividends are almost non-existent, so far I have only found one of our holdings, namely HTGC. Unfortunately, our holding in the named company is far from significant, but every penny is more than welcome.

Hercules Capital, Inc. Common Stock (HTGC), ¢7 with pay date May 20, 2025

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G❤️❤️gle Sheet

The world's most perfect husband has signed up for a 3-year subscription to Seeking Alpha. With this, I have changed the order of our holdings in my Google Sheet from company names to ticker names.

This change took over 6 hours but I also managed to change the look of one of my charts that I wasn't happy with. Now the chart is exactly as I originally wanted it to be but never managed to create. Honestly, I don't know how I managed to create this chart, but I did it all by myself.

The chart consists of two bars, the right one shows our total estimated dividends for 2025, while the left one shows executed dividends where the red part refers to extra dividends. Once again, I have to give Google Sheet my praise.

The image below shows the new improved chart compared to the previous one.

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Speaking of lies and dishonesty

For transparency and my own agenda, I strongly dislike our previous government, the Social Democrats with the support of the Green Party and the tacit acceptance of the Left Party. Politically, I am very far from the Swedish Social Democrats, their partner parties, communism and socialism.

Every May Day, several demonstrations are organized around Sweden by the Left. Social Democrats party leader Magdalena Andersson gave her first May Day speech in Malmoe this year. According to news reporting from state-owned Swedish Radio (SR), the Social Democrats, who are in opposition this term, want to change the pension system so that it benefits those who start working early to a greater extent than today. This statement is the exact opposite of what they actually did the last time they were in power.

The Social Democrats proudly write on their own website that on June 22, 2022, when they were in power last time, the government voted through an amending budget that increased the guarantee pension and thereby reduced the "respectful distance" between the national old-age pension and the guarantee pension.

The national old-age pension is paid on the basis of earned salary to citizens who have worked and contributed to the public sector. The guarantee pension is paid to citizens who have never worked and therefore never contributed to the public sector.

According to SPF Seniorerna, one of Sweden's largest senior organizations, the respect distance for 2025 will be as follows:

A person born in 1945 and had a monthly salary of $4,000 will receive a national old-age pension of $1,794 while a person with a guaranteed pension will receive $1,773.

If you instead were born in 1955 and had a monthly salary of $4,000 will receive a national old-age pension of $1,971 while a person with a guaranteed pension will receive $1,773.

This change was voted through exactly 88 days before the 2022 Swedish election, meaning it was among the last measures the Social Democrats implemented before being voted out. This proves what they do in power as opposed to what they say in opposition.

If you want to be certain something gets done, do it yourself

When I asked our friends for help with my resume, there was no problem in helping us since they owe us several favors and they were happy to help us back. However, it would be their daughter who created it because she has this particular skill.

The day before yesterday, my friend called me and said that their daughter is overloaded with work right now so it would be a week or two before she could even start on my resume. During this phone call, she repeated her daughter's lack of time four times. So yesterday I texted my friend and said I didn't want to put pressure on her daughter and said I was going to create my own resume.

This was the first and last time I ever asked for help.

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A revelation

My ignorance and hypocrisy have contributed to the Woke movement. The daughter of a close friend, born in 2001, has spent most of her life expressing her opinions, including those everyone knew were inaccurate, completely unchallenged with doleful consequences as a result.

My friend's intentions were "good" as she wanted to build her daughter's self-confidence and ability to stand up for herself. Unfortunately, this has led to this 24-year-old woman today being completely incapable to accept that any of her opinions are wrong.

The last time I met them, her claim was so blatantly false that I, despite my better judgment, questioned her position and countered it with facts. It all ended with her getting up and leaving the room while shouting quote "you don't understand anything" unquote.

I take full responsibility for the fact that my silence over the years has contributed to her inability to see the big picture, and if I'm being completely honest, there are probably more young people around me to whom I have done the same thing. To top it all off, my friend and I haven't spoken to each other since this happened.

However, neither I nor the world's most perfect husband have let the opinions of the world's most perfect teenager go unchallenged. He has always had to substantiate and argue for his positions.

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Sad times await

We have continued with our acquisitions and today we purchased a small number of shares in Prudential Financial, Inc. Common Stock (PRU) and VICI Properties Inc. Common Stock (VICI).

The factor that has the greatest impact on our portfolio is the exchange rate difference between the Swedish krona (SEK) and the US dollar (USD). Today, the falling SEK has increased the value of our stock portfolio even though the share prices of our holdings have decreased.

In contrariety to today, when SEK weakened, it has strengthened significantly earlier this year. This strengthening is due to Swedish small savers abandoning the American market in favor of the domestic one. Today's strengthening of the Swedish krona may be a first sign that the Swedes' sale of American investments has ended and a weakening of the krona is to be expected in the near future.

Unfortunately, the air has completely disappeared from the air cushion I had in my Google Sheet in the form of the exchange rate difference. This means that we will not exceed the forecast until the krona has weakened further compared to today's exchange rate.

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When did taking responsibility become unfashionable?

As long as politicians and journalists, regardless of citizenship, ethnicity, or party affiliation, do not take responsibility for their lies and dishonest news reporting, fake news will be able to thrive without the slightest resistance.

Personally, I am incredibly grateful that Elon Musk acquired X, thereby paving the way for tweets that expose past lies and dishonest news reporting. Claiming you never said something becomes impossible when someone link or post screenshots of past posts that shows the opposite.

It's incredibly satisfying when someone posts a screenshot or a link in a thread where the person who wrote the original tweet wrote something that is the exact opposite of what they wrote or said previously. I loathe people who don't take responsibility for their lies or dishonest news reporting.

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