DBC Ballast — Seed Book Summary (2026-07-11)
Contributors
Mandate recap
DBC Ballast is a low-beta, income-oriented compounding book (benchmark SCHD): dividend growers, quality defensives, and defensive/treasury ETFs, targeting net exposure 60–95%, gross ≤100%, no shorts, max single position 8%, and a portfolio yield target ≥2.5%. This seed book pairs one diversified dividend-growth ETF with nine individual Dividend-King/quality-defensive names and two defensive sector ETFs.
Positions
| Ticker | Target Wt | Target $ | Actual Shares | Actual $ (approx.) | Actual Wt | One-line thesis | |---|---|---|---|---|---|---| | SCHD | 7.0%* | $70,000 | 2,161 | $69,976 | 7.0% | Quality/yield-screened dividend-growth index; income durability by construction. | | JNJ | 8.0% | $80,000 | 304 | $78,107 | 7.8% | 60+yr Dividend King, ~mid-40s% payout, diversified pharma/MedTech post-Kenvue. | | PG | 8.0% | $80,000 | 537 | $78,950 | 7.9% | 65+yr Dividend King, category-leading staples portfolio, low-60s% payout. | | KO | 8.0% | $80,000 | 935 | $78,058 | 7.8% | 60+yr Dividend King, asset-light concentrate model; highest payout ratio here. | | PEP | 8.0% | $80,000 | 568 | $78,010 | 7.8% | 50+yr Dividend King, snacks+beverage diversification vs. pure soft-drink peers. | | VZ | 7.0% | $70,000 | 2,500 | $105,275 | 10.5% | Highest current yield; regulated wireless cash flow vs. elevated leverage. | | HD | 8.0% | $80,000 | 227 | $77,946 | 7.8% | 15+yr dividend growth, Pro-channel flywheel vs. housing-cycle rate sensitivity. | | ABBV | 8.0% | $80,000 | 314 | $77,861 | 7.8% | 50+yr combined streak, Skyrizi/Rinvoq succession vs. Humira erosion tail risk. | | XLU | 8.0% | $80,000 | 1,720 | $78,079 | 7.8% | Regulated-utility sector sleeve; most classically rate-sensitive book position. | | XLP | 8.0% | $80,000 | 928 | $78,068 | 7.8% | Defensive staples sector sleeve; overlaps/diversifies single-name staples book. |
* SCHD trimmed from the original 12% ($120,000) target to 7% (8% single-position cap minus 1pt headroom) — see Gaps below.
Exposure vs. IPS
- Actual book: ~$800,330 invested against ~$1,000,851 live fund equity ≈ 80.0% net/gross — within the 60–95% net band and ≤100% gross cap.
- Cash remaining: ≈ $200,521 (includes the pre-existing cash balance from this fund's prior partial seeding).
- Portfolio yield: not independently computed this session, but all ten holdings are established dividend payers (Dividend Kings/long-streak growers or income-oriented ETFs) with current SEC/trailing yields historically well above the fund's 2.5% policy floor — qualitative confidence high, no numeric portfolio-yield calculation was run.
- Beta target (≤0.75): not independently computed this session; the utilities/staples/telecom tilt of this book is directionally consistent with a sub-market beta, but this should be confirmed in the fund's first monthly income/beta report.