By Todd Rosenbluth, CFRA
Once a company pays a dividend, there’s a strong likelihood it will continue to return cash to shareholders for years to come. However, it is rare for company to raise its dividend for 20 or even 25 consecutive years. When it happens, we think these companies deserve recognition. Perhaps joining a popular dividend ETF will suffice.
S&P Dow Jones indices reviews existing and potential constituents to its Aristocrats indices on an annual basis based on updated dividend history. On February 1, four stocks will be added to S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats index. Let’s meet the newly crowned dividend royalty — two from the industrials sector and two from financials.
Within industrials, United Technologies (UTX), an aerospace & defense company, raised its quarterly dividend by 5% to $0.74/share in October. Meanwhile, Caterpillar (CAT), part of the construction materials & heavy truck sub-industry, hiked its quarterly dividend by 10% in April to $0.86/share.
Though property & casualty insurer Chubb (CB) raised its quarterly dividend in May by only 2.8% to $0.73/share, it was enough to extend the consecutive annual streak to 25 years. Meanwhile, shareholders in regional bank People’s United Financial (PBCT) experienced an even smaller 1.2% dividend increase in January 2018. Yet this to was enough to help the financial company achieve Aristocratic status.