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It looks like Stepan Company (NYSE:SCL) is about to go ex-dividend in the next 4 days. If you purchase the stock on or after the 28th of August, you won't be eligible to receive this dividend, when it is paid on the 15th of September.
Stepan's upcoming dividend is US$0.28 a share, following on from the last 12 months, when the company distributed a total of US$1.10 per share to shareholders. Looking at the last 12 months of distributions, Stepan has a trailing yield of approximately 1.0% on its current stock price of $114.33. Dividends are a major contributor to investment returns for long term holders, but only if the dividend continues to be paid. As a result, readers should always check whether Stepan has been able to grow its dividends, or if the dividend might be cut.
See our latest analysis for Stepan
Dividends are typically paid out of company income, so if a company pays out more than it earned, its dividend is usually at a higher risk of being cut. Stepan is paying out just 22% of its profit after tax, which is comfortably low and leaves plenty of breathing room in the case of adverse events. A useful secondary check can be to evaluate whether Stepan generated enough free cash flow to afford its dividend. It distributed 30% of its free cash flow as dividends, a comfortable payout level for most companies.
It's encouraging to see that the dividend is covered by both profit and cash flow. This generally suggests the dividend is sustainable, as long as earnings don't drop precipitously.
Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.
Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?
Businesses with strong growth prospects usually make the best dividend payers, because it's easier to grow dividends when earnings per share are improving. If business enters a downturn and the dividend is cut, the company could see its value fall precipitously. For this reason, we're glad to see Stepan's earnings per share have risen 14% per annum over the last five years. Earnings per share are growing rapidly and the company is keeping more than half of its earnings within the business; an attractive combination which could suggest the company is focused on reinvesting to grow earnings further. This will make it easier to fund future growth efforts and we think this is an attractive combination - plus the dividend can always be increased later.
The main way most investors will assess a company's dividend prospects is by checking the historical rate of dividend growth. In the last 10 years, Stepan has lifted its dividend by approximately 8.6% a year on average. It's encouraging to see the company lifting dividends while earnings are growing, suggesting at least some corporate interest in rewarding shareholders.