Dividend Increases in January

Several Dividend Aristocrats have increased their dividends in January. The companies are:
New Old Change
AFLAC Inc – Ticker AFL 0.96 0.82 17.07%
Comerica Inc – Ticker CMA 2.64 2.56 3.13%
Consolidated Edison – Ticker ED 2.34 2.32 0.86%
Family Dollar Stores– Ticker FDO 0.50 0.46 8.70%
McGraw-Hill Companies– Ticker MHP 0.88 0.82 7.32%

From this list, the only company that fits my fundamental criteria is MHP, which has a one year dividend growth rate of 7.32%. In terms of changes within the index I expect that SNV might be removed from the dividend aristocrats list. The reason is that its shareholders have received shares in TSYS, which was completely spun off from Synovus in the transaction at the beginning of 2008. On paper the dividend will be cut, but in reality this reflects a spin off and I guess the dividend aristocrats committee does not take into consideration the cash that stockholders received. I believe that SNV would keep increasing its dividends over time. The same thing happened with Altria group after the spin-off of KFT. Even though the dividend fell from 0.82 to 0.69, it’s crawling back up at the time of this writing and would soon exceed the pre-spin-off levels.

Expected dividend increases in February

Based off historical information from this spreadsheet, I would expect that the following companies increase their dividend in February: MMM ABT ADM CINF KO KMB NUE PBI SHW SIAL WWY. Those dividend aristocrats have increased their dividends during every month of February over the past 4 years. Upon a closer examination of the dividend growth behavior of the 60 dividend aristocrats, it seems that every month there is at least one company that raises its dividend. It’s nice to get a pay raise every month. The only company that has increased its dividend twice in one year is STT- State Street.

Relevant Articles:

- Dividend Aristocrats List for 2009
- Dividend Aristocrats
- Best Dividends Stocks for the Long Run
- Best High Yield Dividend Stocks for 2009
- Best CD Rates