15 Safe Dividend Kings for This Summer: Part 1

Investment Underground looked for top stocks that are offering hefty dividends. This is what we found: Foot Locker (FL): The shoe and sporting goods retailer has a market cap of $3.58B and offers a 2.8% dividend. This dividend grew substantially before the financial crisis, but has leveled off the last couple of years. A stronger recovery could easily lead to a dividend boost from the company. Additionally, the balance sheet has very little debt, and the stock has been red-hot lately, rising over 80% in the last 12 months. Its P/E ratio of 17.52 is very similar to competitors like The Finish Line (FINL), and the firm brought in EBITDA of over $400M in last year. Although it is not in a traditional high-growth industry, EPS leaped up in 2011 with the economic recovery, and with its strong... more

15 Safe Dividend Kings for This Summer: Part 2

Exxon Mobil (XOM): Like Chevron (CVX), ExxonMobil’s price will largely be determined by the general economy and the price of oil. Nonetheless, there is a lot to like about this stock, and we even prefer it to CVX. XOM has a market cap of $419.8B, making it the largest company in the entire world. The stock pays a 2.21% dividend, and the trailing P/E of 12.11 is slightly higher than Chevron’s, but is still right around the industry average. As such a huge company, Exxon is incredibly diversified, both geographically and in business segments. Considering its strong balance sheet, which is almost debt-free, the only real risks with Exxon are the price of oil and an overall economic meltdown. On the other hand, the company has surprising upside considering its enormity. The firm recently... more

Graham Corporation Declares Quarterly Cash Dividend

Graham Corporation (NYSE Amex: GHM) announced that its Board of Directors, at its regular meeting today, declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.02 per common share.... more

Amphenol Announces Third Quarter 2011 Dividend Payment

Amphenol Corporation (NYSE: APH) confirmed today that its Board of Directors approved a continuing quarterly dividend on its Common Stock in the amount of $.015 per share at its meeting held on July 27, 2011. The Company will pay its third quarter dividend for 2011 on or about October 5, 2011 to shareholders of record as of September 14, 2011.... more

Penn Virginia Corporation Declares Dividend

Penn Virginia Corporation (NYSE: PVA) announced today that its Board of Directors declared a regular quarterly dividend of $0.05625 per share payable September 2, 2011 to shareholders of record at the close of business on August 9, 2011. This will be PVA’s 458th consecutive quarterly dividend payment.... more

4 Dividend Stocks With Liquidity Growth and Strong Sources of Profitability

When choosing stocks for their dividend income, one important consideration is the company’s liquidity. If a company’s profitability suffers and threatens the dividend yield, the company can use its liquidity to continue paying the dividend. Therefore, liquid companies pay more reliable dividend yields. We wanted to run a screen on dividend stocks for those with strong liquidity growth as well as strong sources of profitability. We first screened for dividend stocks (paying dividend yields between 2-7% with sustainable payout ratios below 35%) with high liquidity growth, comparing the current asset 10-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) with the current liabilities growth rate. We then ran a DuPont analysis of return on equity (ROE) profitability. ROE can be broken up into three... more

9 Low Beta Utility Stocks Yielding Over 4%

The U.S. economy continues to have significant headwinds (e.g., high unemployment, end of QE2, weak housing market, etc.) and the looming debt ceiling deadline has certainly enhanced investor uncertainty.In the current market environment, it is important for income investors to choose their dividend stocks wisely as they are putting new money to work. As volatility increases (especially downside volatility), investors may want to add some low beta stocks to their holdings to help dampen portfolio volatility. In general, companies with low betas will tend to be less volatile than the general market.In general, Utility stocks hold up very well in a stagnating economy. In addition, since most utility stocks tend to operate with relatively high debt levels, a low interest rate environment is... more

Calumet Specialty Products Partners' Dividend Is Safe

Here, we'll highlight a given company and its closest competitors to see just how safe their dividends are, with a little help from three crucial tools: The interest coverage ratio, or earnings before interest and taxes, divided by interest expense. The interest coverage ratio measures a company's ability to pay the interest on its debt. An interest coverage ratio less than 1.5 is questionable; a number less than 1 means that the company is not bringing in enough money to cover its interest expenses. The EPS payout ratio, or dividends per share divided by earnings per share. The EPS payout ratio measures the percentage of earnings that go toward paying the dividend. A ratio greater than 80% is worrisome. The FCF payout ratio, or dividends per share divided by free cash... more

4 Tech Stocks With Rapid Dividend Growth Being Bought By Smart Money

If you are interested in the tech sector but also appreciate dividend income with your stocks, you may find this list very interesting. We ran a screen on tech sector stocks paying dividend yields above 2% and sustainable payout ratios below 35% for those that are seeing high growth in their dividend, comparing the current year dividend estimate to the trailing-twelve-month dividend per share. We then screened for stocks that have also seen significant net institutional buying over the current quarter.Interactive Chart: Press Play to compare changes in analyst ratings over the last two years for the stocks mentioned below. Analyst ratings sourced from Zacks Investment Research.Your browser does not support iframes. We also created a price-weighted index of the stocks mentioned below, and... more

Why Dividend Stocks Make Great Acquisitions

Dividend Investing is one of the most misunderstood investment strategies. This strategy tries to focus on companies which have strong brands, wide moats and a customer base which is willing to pay a premium for the product or service the company is providing. These quality characteristics allow select dividend stocks to generate growing earnings per share, and generate excess cash flows each year. This excess financial liquidity is what provides the fuel for a corporate culture, where dividends are increased every year.It is important to pay reasonable valuations for dividend growth stocks however, as buying them at ridiculous P/E ratios could lead to subpar returns over time. The nature of products and services that some of the best dividend stocks in the world deliver however makes... more