Dividends have come roaring back – now is a good time to pile in
London’s banks, miners and oil giants are making 2021 a prosperous year for income-hungry investors
5 August 2021 • 6:00am
Nowhere is the return to normality clearer or more welcome than in the restoration of company dividends. For yield-focused investors the past 18 months have been a testing time, but 2021 looks easier for those who care as much about the income from their investments as how far and fast they will grow. As index-linked final salary pensions become just a fond memory, that will be most of us in due course.
BMO Capital and Income Investment Trust has seen a 1% increase in dividend in comparison to the six-months ended 31 March 2020.The dividend for this half-year of 5.25p will provide shareholders with an annual yield of 3.8%.
FTSE 100 dividends surged in April. More passive income for UK shareholders! Image source: Getty Images.
One joy of being a veteran value investor is watching dividends pile up. Dividends are cash payments made to shareholders, usually half-yearly or quarterly. These distributions can be taken as cash, or reinvested into more shares. Not all companies pay dividends, but most
FTSE 100 firms do.
FTSE 100 dividends crashed in 2020
As Covid-19 spread in early 2020, many British businesses feared for their future. UK dividends slumped last year, as companies cut, cancelled or delayed payouts. Some of the biggest cuts came from UK banks and financial firms and from oil supermajors
Source: Link Group’s Dividend Monitor
In Other News
FE fundinfo has added Richard Watts (Jupiter), Anthony Srom (Fidelity) and Terry Smith (Fundsmith) to the 2021 Alpha Manager ‘Hall of Fame’ list.
The Hall of Fame, which recognises managers who have been ‘Alpha-rated’ consistently over a period of seven years, now stands at 51 managers in total.
To gain an Alpha rating, fund managers are ranked according to their track records since 2000, with extra weighting applied to those with longer track records.
The rating is based on three components: risk-adjusted alpha; consistency of outperformance versus their benchmark; and outperformance in both up and down markets.
UK dividend falls slow to pre-pandemic levels
By Jon Yarker 26
th April 2021 12:01 am
Falls in UK dividends have slowed to pre-pandemic levels according to Link Group’s Dividend Monitor, suggesting the beginning of a bounce back.
The latest Dividend Monitor shows payouts were £12.7bn in the first quarter, reflecting a 26.7 per cent fall on a year-on-year basis.
However, this decline is the slowest in a year and half of companies indicated more positive sentiment by increasing, restarting or just holding their dividends steady.
As such, Link now expects underlying dividends to rise 5.6 per cent to £66.4bn for the year with headline dividends having the potential to surge 17.2 per cent to £74.9bn.