May 7, 2013
5 Small-Cap Medical Equipment Stocks That Pay Dividends
 Demand for medical equipment, supplies, and appliances is timeless. Yet, out of all publicly traded medical equipment companies, only a small handful pay dividends. The following companies develop medical equipment, possess market caps of less than $2 billion, and pay regular cash dividends to shareholders. 1. Conmed (CNMD) develops equipment and devices for minimally invasive procedures and monitoring. Its products range from defibrillators to vital sign monitors, and its devices are used in a wide range of operations. Share Price: $31.21 Market Cap: $885.53M Dividend: $0.15/quarter (1.92% annually) Conmed’s business is currently stronger than ever. Its stock reached an all-time high this March at $34.48. It also began paying a quarterly dividend at the beginning of 2012, which indicates Conmed expects free cash flow to continue to grow. After pulling back around 10% since its high, Conmed now trades at (more)…
April 25, 2013
Apple Now Tops the List of These Dividend Heavy Hitters
 Apple’s (AAPL) earnings report showed that the company, while still dominant in the mobile market, will have to contend with slower growth in the near future. Meanwhile the company has no new product releases planned to either satisfy investors, or fend off the competition until at earliest this fall, at least according to CEO Tim Cook. What the company does have is a quasi-mythical pile of cash that it has been sitting on for some time. Over the past few months, there have been many high-profile attempts to get Apple to give some of this back to its investors. With the release of earnings on Tuesday, the company finally decided to follow this course of action, promising shareholders $100 billion in buybacks and dividend payouts through 2015. With Apple’s 15 percent increase to its quarterly dividend to $3.05 per share, (more)…
April 24, 2013
Apple Cashback Plan: How Will Investors Respond to $100 Billion in Stock Buybacks and Dividends?
 Commenting on the goings-on of computer company Apple (AAPL) has for some time now constituted an industry in itself. Since the company’s shares embarked on a sharp downward turn last September that has shown no signs of abating, this would-be industry has been picking up steam. Ahead of Apple’s earnings report on Tuesday, it had positively gone in to overdrive. For all the anticipation, however, the numbers presented an outline of the company’s current predicament that is for all intents and purposes in keeping with what is already known. Apple came in ahead of expectations in key areas during the first quarter. Net earnings were $9.5 billion, or $10.09 per share on revenue of $43.6 billion, beating analysts’ estimates of $9.98 per share on $42.3 billion in revenue. The company sold 37.4 million iPhones, a healthy jump from the expected (more)…
April 23, 2013
MetLife Spikes on First Dividend Hike in Six years
 Shares for the United States’ biggest life insurance provider MetLife (MET) were up over 6 percent to as high as $38.35 on Tuesday, as the company announced that it would be increasing its dividend payout for the first time since 2007. Last year, MetLife’s $2 billion share buyback and dividend $1.10 per share dividend increase plans were nixed by the Federal Reserve, whose stress tests found that the company would fall short of the capital requirements deemed necessary for financial institutions to survive severe and unexpected disruptions to the economy. In 2011, the company announced its intent to end its bank holding operations that alone were keeping it under the careful scrutiny of Federal Reserve regulators. In February, MetLife officially ended its status as a bank with approval from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Federal Reserve when it (more)…
5 Small Cap Dividend Stocks in Healthcare
 Dividend-paying small-cap healthcare stocks are a rare breed, but certainly exist nonetheless. The following companies all possess market caps less than $2 billion, pay quarterly dividends, and provide services in the healthcare, biotech, or medical device industries. Like with any investment, investors should always determine their investment strategy, risk tolerance, and desired portfolio yield, when evaluating these names. Atrion Corp (ATRI) is a supplier of a wide range of medical devices. It is best known for its and fluid delivery and cardiovascular products, and supplies products primarily to niche markets. Atrion’s diverse portfolio of products ranges from soft contact lens cases to open heart surgery devices. Share Price: $195.96 Market Cap: $395.84 million Dividend: $0.56/quarter (1.14% annually) Atrion pays a solid dividend and has raised its payout every year since 2003. However, what’s potentially more attractive to investors is its (more)…
April 18, 2013
As Sam Sees It: Digging Deeper into Dividend Stocks
 Each week, we tap the insight of Sam Stovall, Chief Equity Strategist for S&P Capital IQ, for his perspective on the current market. EQ: As you’ve pointed out before, the hot streak that stocks have enjoyed in the past five months have been led by the defensive sectors, primarily because of their ability to pay better dividends. Why have investors put such a premium on dividend stocks when the market has been so bullish? Stovall: What’s interesting is that you could say that the market has done so well because of the defensive stocks. The first quarter of 2013 saw the S&P 500 rise 10 percent. Without knowing the backdrop, investors probably would’ve thought it was led by the cyclical sectors, only to be surprised that it was, in fact, led by the defensive areas of Consumer Staples, Health Care, and (more)…
April 17, 2013
6 Blue Chips Moonlighting as Growth Stocks
 Blue chip stocks are generally known for being safe investments. A blue chip company has typically been around for years, long enough that it is a household name. It has a market cap in the billions, and its stock price increases, or decreases, at a more gradual pace than growth stocks whose price can fluctuate wildly on even the smallest piece of news. Furthermore, blue chip stocks tend to offer nice healthy dividend yields. Over the last year, however, a number of blue chip stocks have been doubling as or behaving like growth stocks. The following six stocks are all American mega cap companies, whose share prices have gained at least 20 percent over the past 365 days, and whose dividend yields are greater than 2 percent. General Electric Co. (GE) – The energy company’s annual dividend yield is currently (more)…
March 20, 2013
Like High Dividends? BDCs Are Worth A Look!
 High Yielding BDCs With Strong Price Charts In a newspaper column in February 2012, I featured a relatively unknown type of dividend paying stock called Business Development Companies (BDCS). In that column, I described a portfolio of five BDCs paying expected dividend yields ranging from 6.9% to 11.6%. Anyone who bought those five BDCs the day after that column was published and sold one-year later would have averaged a 19% return (dividends plus share price appreciation) compared to 13% for the S&P 500. Given those numbers, it’s worth taking another look at BDCs. First some background and then I’ll give you today’s list. About BDCs Congress created the Business Development Company category a number of years ago to encourage the flow of capital to firms that are too large to borrow from banks, but too small to list on the (more)…
February 25, 2013
5 Small-Cap Services Stocks with High Yielding Dividends
 For those looking to diversify their dividends portfolio, here are five small-cap stocks with market caps under $2 billion from the services sector that are currently offering very high yields (at a rate greater than 10 percent), indicating that they could be of particular interest to investors who are currently inclined towards income producing stocks. It is important to remember that while high dividend yields are certainly attractive, that percentage alone does not automatically make for a smart investment and other financial information should be considered. For instance, a company that offers a high dividend yield should also have enough cash to make good on those payments. As well, it is important to consider a given company’s history of growth, how positive and consistent this growth has been, and is projected to be in the future. Capital Product Partners LP (more)…
February 22, 2013
Interpublic Group Hikes Dividend and Share Buyback Program
 Advertising and marketing company Interpublic Group of Cos. (IPG) said Friday morning that earnings for the fourth quarter increased, largely on the back of the firm selling its remaining stake in Facebook, Inc. (FB), and that it was raising its quarterly dividend by 25 percent. The company, which houses brands such as Draftfcb, FutureBrand, Erickson and more, also said that its board has authorized a new share repurchase program up to $300 million of its common stock. Revenue during the fourth quarter contracted 0.4 percent to $2.06 billion from $2.07 billion in the year prior quarter. Net income for the quarter rose to $316.2 million, or 68 cents per share, versus $261.9 million, or 50 cents per share, in the year prior quarter. Excluding the impact of the Facebook transaction during the fourth quarter of 2012, diluted earnings per share (more)…
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