I know what you're wondering now that Hasbro (NYSE:HAS) has decided to double its dividend. The answer is "no." It won't be doling it out in Monopoly money. Though, yes, at a time when you need a magnifying glass to read the latest money market yields, the company behind Parker Brothers, Playskool, and Milton Bradley bears watching.
After all, a quarterly dividend that amounts to a modest 1.1% yield beats the Potato Head pants off just about every money market fund out there. More importantly, it highlights one of the advantages of dividend-payers over fixed-income securities -- they have the ability to hike their payouts.
That's what draws our Income Investor newsletter to quality equity investments that put out. If a company is performing well and meeting its operating targets, it can reward its shareholders with cash -- more and more over time.
Of course, it doesn't always play out that way. For Hasbro, the new $0.06 a share mark is also symbolic. Just before the holiday rush of the 2000 season, the company warned that it would be lucky to break even, and halved its quarterly payout to $0.03 a share.
There it stayed as the company struggled alongside rival Mattel (NYSE:MAT) as edgy upstarts like LeapFrog Enterprises (NYSE:LF) carved up market share. But now that the maker of Scrabble has placed its fiscal tile on a double word score square, investors can feel better about the company's future prospects.
Indeed, the stock has already doubled over the past year. That may be news to some, but not to most Fools, as Hasbro was one of a few to be recommended both in Motley Fool Stock Advisor and Hidden Gems last year.
And Hasbro is gunning behind its steady producers. For one, it's going after the 4Kids (NYSE:KDE) crowd of Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon players with its new Duel Masters trading card game. While Mattel has made no bones about going after the LeapFrog educational stronghold, Hasbro already has a hit in that big-ticket market with its Video Now player, a brisk seller with favorable reviews on Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN). It also assures a stream of future profits given the growing library of video titles.
So, yes, Hasbro may be paying out more now, but it's the market that should be paying -- attention, that is.
Are you a kid at heart or do you need some help picking out the perfect toys? What are the best playthings for babies and toddlers? What do you need to know about choking hazards? All this and more -- in the Parents and Expecting Parents discussion board. Only on Fool.com.
Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz celebrates family game night weekly, often with Hasbro as the centerpiece. He does not own shares in any companies mentioned in this story.
