Dividend checks continue to get fatter in corporate America, as more companies jack up their distribution rates.
Readers of the Income Investor newsletter can certainly appreciate that kind of thinking. Let's take a closer look at some of the companies that inched their payouts higher this past week.
Let's start with Merck
The drugmaker prescribed a more potent dividend, boosting its quarterly rate 11% to $0.42 a share. This is the first time since 2004 that Merck has juiced up its yield. The seven-year lull has been the result of billion-dollar drugs going off patent and a pipeline that has been slow to replenish the pharmaceuticals giant's fleet of treatments.
Lincoln National
Automatic Data Processing
Finally, we have Prudential Financial
These companies join legal drug dealer AmeriscourceBergen
Subscribers to the Income Investor newsletter can appreciate the companies sending more and more money to their investors. The newsletter singles out companies that are committed to growing their distributions with market-thumping results.
Want to see what is being recommended these days? Go ahead and give the newsletter service a shot with a 30-day trial subscription. Who knows? Maybe the next thing that will get hiked will be your interest.
If you want to track these stocks to see if and when they hike their payouts again, consider adding them to My Watchlist.
- Add Universal to My Watchlist.
- Add Merck to My Watchlist.
- Add Lincoln National to My Watchlist.
- Add Automatic Data Processing to My Watchlist.
- Add AmerisourceBergen to My Watchlist.