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Argo Group International Holdings, Ltd. (NYSE:ARGO) is about to trade ex-dividend in the next four days. You can purchase shares before the 27th of August in order to receive the dividend, which the company will pay on the 11th of September.
Argo Group International Holdings's next dividend payment will be US$0.31 per share, on the back of last year when the company paid a total of US$1.24 to shareholders. Based on the last year's worth of payments, Argo Group International Holdings stock has a trailing yield of around 3.6% on the current share price of $34.82. Dividends are an important source of income to many shareholders, but the health of the business is crucial to maintaining those dividends. So we need to check whether the dividend payments are covered, and if earnings are growing.
See our latest analysis for Argo Group International Holdings
If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Argo Group International Holdings lost money last year, so the fact that it's paying a dividend is certainly disconcerting. There might be a good reason for this, but we'd want to look into it further before getting comfortable.
Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.
Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?
Companies with falling earnings are riskier for dividend shareholders. If earnings decline and the company is forced to cut its dividend, investors could watch the value of their investment go up in smoke. Argo Group International Holdings reported a loss last year, and the general trend suggests its earnings have also been declining in recent years, making us wonder if the dividend is at risk.
Many investors will assess a company's dividend performance by evaluating how much the dividend payments have changed over time. In the last 10 years, Argo Group International Holdings has lifted its dividend by approximately 15% a year on average.
Remember, you can always get a snapshot of Argo Group International Holdings's financial health, by checking our visualisation of its financial health, here.
The Bottom Line
Has Argo Group International Holdings got what it takes to maintain its dividend payments? It's definitely not great to see that it paid a dividend despite reporting a loss last year. Worse, the general trend in its earnings looks negative in recent times. These characteristics don't generally lead to outstanding dividend performance, and investors may not be happy with the results of owning this stock for its dividend.