With a new year and a new month upon us, it is time, once again, for me to outline my potential stock picks for my dividend growth portfolio. I’ll continue to preface this post with my usual rant about how important it is to ignore all the financial panic that’s being spewed by the mainstream media. As we all know by now there is never a perfect time to invest. There will always be some political, financial, economic or social worry that indicates an imminent correction or collapse. It can be North Korea, oil prices (too low or too high, take your pick : ) ), inflation, deflation, Ukraine, Russia, market valuations, remember Ebola, global warming, freezing winter weather, South China Sea, how about Somali pirates (been kind of quiet lately), Iran, Syria, ISIS, Brexit, Greece, U.S. debt, government shutdown and anything else you would like to add to this never-ending and ever-evolving list. Bottom line, don’t be afraid to invest in a consistent and systematic manner. Over the long haul, being invested and staying invested in the stock market gives you the best long-term odds of success. With that being said, let’s take a look at my January 2018 potential stock pick(s).

First up, is a name that has not been popular at all in 2017 and continues to struggle in the near term, General Electric Company (GE). This was a December stock consideration of mine as well as my last purchase in 2017. I know there is a lot of uncertainty regarding this stock in the near term but seeing it priced well into the teens it is becoming more compelling as a lot of the negative news surrounding this company seems to baked into the current stock price. Barring some massive sell-off in the market or other world events I don’t see much more downside to this stock. Of course, Mr. Market always has the last word and GE, or any stock for that matter, can tank and new names not mentioned in this post may suddenly look attractive on any given day. That’s just the nature of investing.

Next, I am considering a health sector stock that has also been hammered this year, Cardinal Health, Inc. (CAH). This dividend stalwart continues to pay out a safe dividend with a yield that is also relatively high for this stock. At current prices, the stock still seems fairly valued even after climbing from its 52 week low.

Sticking to the health sector several health REITs are looking very attractive to me as well. Names like HCP, Inc. (HCP), Welltower Inc. (HCN) and LTC Properties, Inc. (LTC) have seen significant declines the past few months and are looking a lot more attractive these days when compared to just last summer. In fact, all my health REITs have been performing rather poorly and are offering more compelling prices and yields at current levels.