Dividend Champions For March 2017

The Dividend Champions spreadsheet and PDF have been updated through 2/28/17 and are available here. Note that all references to Champions mean companies that have paid higher dividends for at least 25 straight years; Contenders have streaks of 10-24 years; Challengers have streaks of 5-9 years. "CCC" refers to the universe of Champions, Contenders, and Challengers.
The Floodgates Open
As expected, dividend-increase activity surged in February, confirming its reputation as the busiest month of the year for those declarations. I expect this trend to continue through March and into April, when Annual Shareholder meetings "season" gets underway, although the pace may slow slightly. The next few months stand out not only in terms of extending impressive streaks of increases, but also in terms of new Challengers and Near-Challengers.
After the CCC universe expanded to a total of 788 companies at the end of January, that population surged to 813 companies in February, which featured 27 new Challengers, 2 deletions and one promotion. The Near Challengers listing also picked up 19 "NEW" notations (in Appendix B on the Notes tab), bringing the number of Near-Challengers to 115, sown from 120 last month, still well below the record of 281 companies in September 2014.
After January's action saw the average price of CCC stocks dip by 23¢, that figure rose by $1.23 in February. The average "age" of the dividend streaks declined from... Read more