Monday, April 22, 2013

Dividends on the Rise

Are you a dividend investor? The low yields being paid out by bonds these days have focused increased attention on dividend-paying stocks, which allow many investors to get the income they used to get from bonds while also taking advantage of the capital appreciation that stocks provide.

Investors have traditionally looked to large, well-established companies for dividends. Among companies in the Standard & Poor's 500,  some 81 percent of them are now paying a dividend.

But the phenomenon is growing among smaller stocks as well. According to S&P Dow Jones Indices, some 46 percent of all companies that are too small to get into the S&P 500 are paying dividends as of the first quarter of 2013. That's up from 42 percent for the year-earlier quarter.

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