Stocks Under Consideration – Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT), General Electric Company (NYSE:GE)
Many longterm investors follow a dividend-growth investing strategy which requires investment in the stocks of companies that not only pay dividends, but consistently increase their dividends from year to year. The goal is to create a sustainable, rising stream of dividend income that will eventually allow me to be financially secure in retirement. It is a known fact that owning high quality companies with a consistent dividend policy produces superior longer term returns versus the averages, especially when considering risk. Dividend paying, high quality companies tend to have stable business models which perform well in both good and bad economic times. These types of companies produce returns that are less volatile than the overall stock market.
The important indication of dividend power is not so much a high dividend yield but high company quality, which you can discover through its history of dividends, which should increase over time. If you are a long-term investor, looking for such companies can be very rewarding.
The following stocks have lifted dividends each year for several years in a row.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) traded 21,684,002 shares on last trading session with closing price of $68.81.
MSFT was trading -1.29% below its 52-week high and 45.98% above its 52-week low. Its last 5-Year EPS growth stands at -4.90%; with earnings growth of 30.60% yoy. The stock stands 4.95% above the average-price of 50 days and 3.18% compared with the SMA 20.
The stock has a 1-year performance up 41.61% and a positive weekly performance at 0.79%. Moreover, the stock is up 4.69% in one month through last close, to $68.81, showing a 9.59% return during the past three months. The company is set at a mean analysts’ recommendation of 2.10.
MSFT has been paying dividends since 2003 and has raised their dividend for 11 consecutive years. It has a dividend yield of 2.20% and a 5 year dividend growth rate of 15.85%. Their payout ratio is 66.00%.
General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) shares moved to $29.20 after opening the day at $29.27, on Thursday. The stock floated in a price range of $29.05 to $29.31, with market capitalization of $256.40B. The stock exchanged hands with 19,594,774 shares lower as compared to its average daily volume of 29.26M shares. If we take a look on its volatility, 0.91 percent was seen in a week and for the month it was 1.09 percent.
The company’s net profit margin stands at 6.60% whereas its return on equity (ROE) is 9.80%. It has 8.74B of outstanding shares and its shares float measured at 8.70B. The average analysts gave this company a mean recommendation of 2.30.
GE first paid dividend in 1899 and has increased their dividend for 0 straight years. They have a dividend yield of 3.20% and a 5 year dividend growth rate of 8.11%.